


War Crimes(Burning Inside Out)

by TheTrillion



Series: War Criminals(dance with Icarus) [2]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003), Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: -I'm so sorry I forgot to tag this, -Ish, Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Tolls, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Amestris is a fucking mess, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bradley had a very strong Point, Child Soldiers, Chimera Edward Elric, Colonel Edward Elric, Ed is both dead and not dead, Ed is forcibly drafted, Ed's a massive fucking mess, Edward Elric Swears, Elements of '03 Anime, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Greed's chimeras live, How Do I Tag, Human Beings Were Never Meant To Touch The Gate, Hurt Edward Elric, Hurt/Comfort, I haven't changed many of the dates, I take Edwards happiness and shoot it with a shotgun out back, I take the law of Equivalent Exchange and shoot that too, I warned you this would be a Mess, I'm rambling dfalsjdg, I've never seen all of it so I'm sorry, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Ishbalan | Ishvalan Alphonse Elric, Ishbalan | Ishvalan Edward Elric, Ishval Civil War, Ishval War of Extermination, It shows, M/M, Maes Hughes Lives, Me bullshiting my way through Alchemy explainations, Minor Character Death, Multi, Nightmares, Nina Tucker Lives, Older Edward Elric, Order 3066, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Professor Edward Elric, Rape/Non-con Elements, Resembool is Burned for hiding Ishvalans, Sort Of, Suicidal Ideation, This Will be another Mess I'm sorry, This is dark ok, Torture, Trauma, Underage Drinking by our laws, War isn't equivalent, Winry Alphonse and Edward are siblings and you can fight me on that, Xerxes | Cselkcess, and Devil Symbolism, and no one knows why or how, and nor is Ed's life, and then beat it with a baseball bat, befriending Ed means losing all your rights to personal space, happens, he gets better though, here are the warning tags:, lots and lots of Angel Symbolism, lots of death, no one really minds, none of it happens between Ed/Roy/Riza, please check notes at the start of each chapter for more possible warnings, semi-modern, so it's still 1900, some may be added the longer I write, the focus is more on platonic relationships than romantic, the romance just kinda, they're also geniuses in their own ways, those are the warnings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-28
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2020-10-30 03:40:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 24,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20807921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheTrillion/pseuds/TheTrillion
Summary: “I always wondered, if this wasn’t just how it was meant to end.”“A grim belief.”“You telling me there’s something other than human weapons State Alchemists were meant to be?”“No. It’s just grim.”Transcript of conversation between Warrant Officer Jefferson Buvernes and Second Lieutenant Donnuv Fel. Filed May 7 (1908).Or: War doesn't abide by Equivalent Exchange





	1. Of Trenches and Hawks

**Author's Note:**

> (Edit: so as of June 17, this thing has been edited a bit- I added some scenes and adjusted some others. Overall, not many big changes, but this is just a warning for anyone that read this before now)
> 
> This took forever to write dgkasjhgkjebr
> 
> Inspired by Mud Grave and Sniper Au by https://obersten.tumblr.com/
> 
> the formattings a bit weird cause of how I was writing it, so keep in mind that Ed's first and second years in the war alternate. His first starts with Luise and ends with the Ishvalan child with the gun. His second starts with the Brigadier General and ends at the end of this chapter
> 
> 90% of this is utter bullshit, you've been warned. It was written at like 2 am consistently cause that was the only time I seemed to be able to write it with the tone I wanted.
> 
> This technically does have elements of '03 Anime, simply taken from what I've read about it, but the only thing really is that the Gate is a way to Alternate worlds. I've never fully watched '03, so I can't say how many elements of it this has, but the other worlds is a definite.
> 
> You don't have to read the one before this to understand the plot. They can both be read as individual works that don't affect the other. This one tells a more complete story of what happens to Amestris.
> 
> There are Original Characters but if it makes you feel better most of them die right after they're introduced.
> 
> this entire thing is a fucking mess. I've warned you. have fun reading it.

_ “I always wondered, if this wasn’t just how it was meant to end.” _

_ “A grim belief.” _

_ “You telling me there’s something other than human weapons State Alchemists were meant to be?” _

_ “No. It’s just grim.” _

Transcript of conversation between Warrant Officer Jefferson Buvernes and Second Lieutenant Donnuv Fel. Filed May 7 (1908).

* * *

Edward thinks he might’ve been holy once, in between his father’s and mother’s arms. Thinks he might’ve been holy helping his brother fly above the clouds.

He thinks he might’ve been holy, before he reached for the sun. Thinks he might’ve holy before he sold his body, mind and soul. Before he ignored all of his brother’s worries, his hesitations.

He thinks he might’ve been holy. Now he knows he’s nothing but a monster wearing an angel’s skin. A monster playing at God’s pet. All that’s left are the seven foot deep trenches and the bones of the dead.

He might’ve been holy once. Now all he is, is pyrite placed on a pedestal.

* * *

Edward’s four years old and gazing out at the array his father created in awe. His father’s hand moved steadily as he sketched out more lines, complex enough that Ed’s head is sent spinning even as he tries to keep up. His father finishes the rest of the array quickly and Ed lifts his hands up but doesn’t touch the circle.

“It’s safe,” his father murmurs after a moment. “Stop pushing energy in the moment it feels like too much, okay Edward?”

Ed nods erratically, a bright grin on his face as he struggles to not wiggle out of his father’s lap and to slap a hand down on the array.

He gasps, eyes widening in amazement the moment his brain computes the world he never knew he longed for before now.

The world  _ pulsed  _ around him, filled with so much  _ life  _ it was incredible. He kept his hands pressed tightly against the chalk circle, feeding as much energy into it as he could. He could feel his father’s warm light behind him, the massive pillar of energy like the sun in a desert. It wrapped around him tightly, filled with too many emotions for Ed to even begin to describe.

He could feel his baby brother, napping in the other room, a star burning bright in the sky. It was a soothing, steady light, muffled with sleep, and Ed almost wanted to reach out to touch it.

He didn’t- didn’t want to disturb the steadiness of the light, lest he wake his brother- and instead focused on his mother in the kitchen. Her light rolled like waves, licking at everything around it. Coiled tightly in the center, it felt almost  _ sharp  _ in an odd cold-warm way. Ed brushed against that one, and felt what he could only guess was amusement responding as the light pressed back to him.

Ed kept searching around, feeling around for other lights. He was just about to drive his attention towards where he was pretty sure the Rockbell’s house was when his father gently pulled his hands away from the array. The sense dimmed greatly, but Ed was delighted to know it hadn’t completely disappeared.

“Incredible, isn’t it?” He asked softly, fingers combing through Ed’s hair and his body swayed. “What you just felt is _qi,_ the life force of everything living around you. It’ll get stronger the more you use it, but I’m sure you’ll get the hang of it fast.” 

He sighed behind Ed, arms going to wrap around the four year old as he stood up, pressing a kiss to Ed’s hair and wiping the desk clean of chalk. “You and your brother are prodigies, after all. Let’s get you to bed, that arrays always taxing to use.”

Edward scowled, but didn’t argue, head already lulling against his father’s chest. He fell asleep before he even reached his bed, listening to his father’s heart as he was carried out of the study, warm happiness wrapped up in a blanket surrounding him.

* * *

Ed held his shirt over his mouth tightly, feeling woozy as he stumbled through the smoke. He clenched the rings and collar in his hand tightly, feeling sick as he tried to not breathe through his nose. He could still smell burning flesh and he wanted to  _ hurl. _

(It might’ve been a terrible idea to touch the bodies but he knew Winry would want  _ something  _ to remember them by and everything else was in flames. Still, he knew he’d be seeing the charred remains in his nightmares for the next ten years at  _ least.) _

Moving out of the house, Edward bit down a cry as his left leg flared with agony as he stumbled down the steps, his eyes staying stubbornly dry even as spots danced across his vision.

He wished tears would come to them, if only to clear out the ashes and soot there.

If he even deserved that. If he deserved the relief from that, after he was one of the reasons Resembool was burning around him, the fields choked with smoke and flames.

He nearly bit his tongue when he pressed the metals into Winry’s hands, her teary face burned into his mind.

“I’m sorry,” he managed to choke out, throat _aching_ with the words, with forcing them out.

_ I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m so fucking sorry- _

_ I didn’t mean for this to happen, gods I didn’t mean for this to happen- _

Winry  _ howled. _

* * *

Hell, Edward thought, was his father’s normally warm eyes glaring at him from the doorway.

Hell was the qi Ed had learned to use so quickly twisting up and slamming into a wall, slamming into a steel sheet where there was once a sun filled with warmth and  _ I love you I love you I love you. _

Hell was leading his baby brother away from their mother, leading him to the bathroom like they’d planned. 

Hell was sitting up in bed pressing his hands to his eyes trying to stop the tears from dripping down his face. Was failing miserably at it. He always was a crybaby.

Hell was trying to convince himself he hated his father for leaving him- for leaving _them._ Was trying to convince himself that he wasn’t hurt by it, just angry.

Anger was always so much easier to fall back on than hurt.

  
  


“I’ll fix this,” Ed promises, eleven and the oldest and the one who _has_ to fix it. Eleven and holding his wailing childhood friend tight as she cries for her parents, for Granny, for _anyone._ “I’ll fix it all, don’t worry. I’ll fix it.”

_ I’ll fix it I’ll fix it I’ll fix it I’ll fix it- _

* * *

<em>_“Can_</em> you fix this, Little Al-che-mist?”

* * *

Hell, Edward later amends, was coming home to find his mother collapsed on the floor.

Hell was slapping a hand over his brother’s eyes while desperately searching for a pulse, knowing he won’t find one.

Hell was the funeral, was listening to people trying to convince them that she was in a better place. Hell was being told over and over again that  _ Ishvala has welcomed her with open arms. _

(Hell is giving his brother false hope that they could bring her back. Hell is ignoring all of his brother’s doubts.)

* * *

Teacher knows, Ed thinks after another sparring session. Teacher knows and she’s trying to do everything she can to stop them without outright confronting them.

He should listen to her, he knows. He wonders if she ever thought about performing human transmutation. He knows he should probably talk to her. He won’t, though.

He can do it- he’s calculated and recalculated the exact measurements for two human bodies of his mother and Granny’s age and measurements down to the last gram too many times to back out now. He’s drawn and redrawn the circle they’re going to use over and over again too many times to even think of quitting. He’s poured over too many medical textbooks to go back on his promise.

_ I’ll fix it I’ll fix it I’ll fix it. _

He’ll do it. He’ll get them back. He’ll fix it all. He won’t fail like all the other alchemists that tried before him.

* * *

Hell is the agony of having his body deconstructed, torn apart piece by piece. Hell is the feeling of a knife skinning him alive- except it’s not a knife and the Truth is demanding his toll be paid.

Hell is having the imprint of remembering everything horrible in the world only to forget it. Hell is all the alchemical knowledge in the universe being crammed into his head and only remembering a fraction of it.

Hell is asking for more. (Hell is realizing his brother is gone.)

  
  


“What will you give for your brother, Little Al-che-mist?”

“Anything,” Ed choked on the word, leaned forward until his head was pressed against the floor. Like he was praying. (No God to hear his plea. No God to answer. He never had believed in Ishvala.)  _ “Everything.” _

* * *

Hell is the agony of having metal drilled into milk white bones. Was trying-  _ trying-  _ failing-  _ always failing-  _ to biting back as much of his screams as he could.

Hell is his trembling body, his ragged breathing, chest stuttering. Is  _ weak weak weak not enough  _ rattling his thoughts as he scrambled to keep control, to keep his muscles locked. Is the rag over his eyes slipping off his face.

Hell was watching, for just a few moments, as his shoulder was carved into. Hell was hearing Winry’s uneasy breathing above him as she pressed her body weight on top of him to keep him still.

Hell was looking at her and seeing blood he’d smeared there all those nights ago on her face, over her eyes. Hell was seeing the tears burning in her eyes as she moved a hand over his eyes to stop him from watching.

Hell was being unable to pass out from it, from all the pain and misery and  _ I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry.  _ Unable to escape for just a moment, unable to convince himself he deserved to.

Hell was his mind replaying his brother’s body being deconstructed over and over again as he tried to focus his thoughts away from the agony in his arm that wasn’t there, in his leg that was just a stump. 

Hell was knowing that, regardless of how much losing two limbs hurt, losing his entire body- his entire  _ mind-  _ had hurt Alphonse in far too many more ways.

Was knowing that he’d been the one to lead him there, to that hell. Was knowing he’d broken his promise to  _ protect  _ him so thoroughly that the devil would welcome him with open arms when he finally died.

Hell was his nightmares no longer being conformed to just night. Was his entire being being scraped raw, was his soul being torn into and apart and stitched back together. 

Hell, Edward whispered when he finally woke up after the surgery, was his life.

* * *

“Those were your tolls, right? Your leg for the initial transmutation and your arm for Al.”

Ed can’t quite stop his flinch, though he does try. The Truth’s voice gets louder in the back of his head, the Gate’s promise of  _ rest  _ getting unbearably sweater.

_ Little Al-che-mist,  _ the Truth sings,  _ don’t you want to rest Little Al-che-mist? _

He should tell her, should tell  _ someone.  _ Should tell someone what belonging body mind and soul to the Gate, to the  _ Truth,  _ feels like.

He should tell someone that he’s being broken down, that rats are eating his eyes and maggots are in his brain and leeches are feeding in his blood. Should tell someone that he knows what it feels like to have his soul torn right from his body, to have his soul forced together with too many others all crammed into a space too small. Should tell someone about the chimera labs and silent wars that have a death toll far higher than anyone will admit. Should tell someone about the weapons he’s seen created. About the horrible things he knows humanity has done. 

Should tell someone that he knows what it feels like to die, over and over again. Should tell someone that he knows what it’s like to burn from the inside out. Should tell someone that he knows what it’s like to be shot in the head. Should tell someone that he knows what it’s like to be stabbed, over and over and  _ over  _ again until he’s bleeding out in an alley with no hope of survival. He should tell someone that he knows what it feels like to have someone force him to his knees even though it’s never happened to  _ him. _

He should tell someone about how Amestris was built on the bodies of an empire of innocents and wrongfully spilled blood. Should tell someone about the monsters lurking in the shadows. Should tell someone about the souls he’s somehow never even noticed screaming beneath his feet,  _ howling  _ at him in their pain induced madness.

  
He should tell someone that the call of the Gate, the promise of _rest _from it all is painfully sweet. He should tell someone that he’s rotting, the vultures of the Gate picking at his mind.

He should tell someone. Maybe not Winry, but  _ someone. _

He won’t.

He  _ can’t. _

“Yeah,” Ed says instead. “Those were my tolls.”

He doesn’t look at Winry, keeps his eyes on the wall opposite to them. He’s never been a good liar.

He hopes she doesn’t ask him again. He doesn’t know how much longer he can keep the decay of his soul hidden.

* * *

The monster wearing human skin is speaking to him and  _ he can’t breath. _

A blade is pressed a little harder into his skin, his head yanked back further by his hair. He should listen, the monster can tell he’s not listening, but he’s drowning in  _ wrath. _

“Desert rat,” the monster hisses at him, face filled with an unbearable false kindness. Edward wants to  _ scream. _ “I’ll give you a choice, yes? You’re so young, with so much raw talent. Killing you would be a waste. What do you say, little alchemist?”

Ed chokes, tries not to heave.  _ He knows he knows he knows- _

The monster is smiling at him.  _ Wrath  _ is describing how he’ll kill Ed’s family if he doesn’t do what he asks of him.

What choice does Ed have but to say  _ yes? _ (He’ll trade thousands of lives for his family, he knows. The thought should make him sick. It doesn’t. It just terrifies him. The monster and him are the same.)

Edward stumbles back inside the butchers shop, a silver pocket watch held between clenched fingers. He tries not to tremble.

_ Fullmetal,  _ the monster named him, a mockery of what Edward is.  _ Fullmetal  _ like he is only gold, like there is no snow white in his hair and ruby red in his eyes.  _ Fullmetal  _ like his arm and his leg. Like he’s nothing. Like there’s nothing but  _ pyrite. _

Maybe there isn’t. Maybe it’s just blood.

* * *

Excerpt of “The Trials of War”, an interview between Ellie Sinous(Host) and former Brigadier General Marlounes Harseir (56 min.). First aired Sep. 17 (1921).

**Harseir: ** People will tell you- well I know what people say. Even with a war so recent in our history, everyone still likes to paint it all in pretty colors. Defend your country, they’ll say. Protect the ones you love.

**Sinous: ** You don’t believe that?

**Harseir: **Hell no! I was there, you know, on the Ishvalan Front. I saw what they did. I saw men, women, and _children_ bow down under it all. You should’ve seen their eyes, then you would understand.

**Sinous: ** I think I understand plenty, with your phrasing.

**Harseir: ** No, you really don’t. Don’t give me that look! You didn’t look in the face of a child knowing they’d be dead in minutes all because of one man’s thirst for blood. You didn’t look in the face of a child the military had already trained like a good little dog as they slaughtered their way through town after town and said  _ good job! _

[choked pause]

**Harseir: ** You all say you understand, that you know that war is hard and the military is a terrible place, that the way our government was run was horrible. Yet even years after our military was ripped to shreds in order to show the rot that had been growing in our floorboards for centuries I still find others coming up to me to ask about the good ol’ days, when there was no threat of being arrested for simply defending yourself. How is killing a defenseless teen all because they had red eyes  _ defending yourself? _

* * *

“You shouldn’t be here,” Luise tells him in the trenches, in the mud and muck and rot. “You don’t belong here- what were the higher ups thinking, letting you out here?”

Luise looks so sad. Ed reloads his gun and fires off five more rounds at the enemy line without responding.

“I have a son you age,” Luise says with an odd choke in his voice. His qi is disgusted and aching at the same time. “I never thought I would see someone his age out here.”

Luise is a good man. Between the two of them, Ed knows Luise is the one that doesn’t belong out here. Doesn’t belong between the piles upon piles of dead bodies filling the muddy trenches with maggots and body fluids and blood.

And rats. Rats pick at the eyes.

“You don’t belong here,” Luise says a final time, seeming to realize Ed won’t  _ (can’t)  _ talk, his own gun in his hands firing off twice before he dropped down to duck the returning fire. 

The mud made the trenches dangerous, the pouring rain that hadn’t stopped since Ed had been deployed didn’t show signs of letting up any time soon. It meant his ports ached, meant his movements were stiff. 

It meant that it would be easier to make a mistake. Meant that it would be easier to end up dead.

The thought should terrify him. It doesn’t. He’s a killer, a monster hidden in fools gold. It was only fitting that he might die out here surrounded by corpses, his own body turned against him.

_ You don’t belong here. _

Ed wants to laugh. He doesn’t.

He hopes Luise gets to go home to his son.

(He finds Luise again two weeks later, his face twisted up in horror in his last moments and his legs missing. The rats are picking at his eyes.)

* * *

He’s fourteen and there’s no one around but him and the Brigadier General and he thinks he’s going to be sick.

“On your knees,  _ Fullmetal,” _ The General-  _ fuck,  _ Ed doesn’t even know thier  _ name-  _ snarls at him, title a curse and qi filled with a sicker promise. Filled with rot and pain and  _ you’re a monster. _

Ed doesn’t dare disobey. The ground is rocky under his flesh knee- they’re right on the edge of the desert, everything is rocks and hard dirt. He’s going to have bruises.

The General’s fingers are a vice on his face, prying open his mouth. His blue eyes are daring Ed to fight back.

“Don’t bite,” The man threatens, nails digging into his cheeks. 

Ed wants to, wants to snarl and snap and scratch and bite and  _ hurt  _ the sick excuse for a human being in front of him. Wants to  _ kill  _ him. 

He doesn’t. He can’t. He knows the consequences. He’ll just endure. For Winry, for Alphonse, for Izumi and Sig.

He squeezes his eyes shut to try and block out the world.

_ For Winry, for Alphonse, for Izumi and Sig. _

_ Endure endure endure. _

(it’s ten minutes before he can even think to swallow his own spit, pouring water as hot as he dares to go into his mouth.

He thinks he hates himself a little bit more for it.)

* * *

Edward thinks he might be choking on it, all the decay. Thinks it might be settling in his lungs, infecting him like the Gate’s infected him and tearing him down bit by bit. Thinks it might end up killing him.

Marcus is seventeen when Ed meets him, eyes full of a bright burning fire- a burning  _ drive  _ that makes Ed want to cry.

“I’m going to fix this country,” Marcus tells him one night, Ed tucked into his side as they both tried to stay warm in the unforgiving desert night chill. “I’m going to survive this war and  _ fix it.” _

And Ed-

Ed wants to  _ laugh.  _ Wants to bark it out, sharp and harsh. Wants to ask him  _ what chance do you have against monsters? What chance do you have against these demons soaking our country in blood? What. Chance. Do. You. Have? _

He wants to scream at Marcus, wants to shout about how utterly  _ stupid  _ that idea was. Wants to scream and shake him till he realizes that he shouldn’t be thinking like that. Wants to knock some  _ sense  _ into him.

He wants to cry. Wants to hunch over into himself and sob, wants to let it tear through him. Wants to cry as easily as he had once, when he was five years old and his father’s hateful eyes were burned into the back of his eyelids. He wants that  _ relief  _ again, even if he doesn’t deserve it- even if he doesn’t even deserve to think about it- he still  _ aches  _ for it.

Instead he shuddered, feeling the crawling of thousands of crying souls beneath him as he pressed his face into Marcus’s neck. Feeling the screaming  _ fear  _ all around him.

“Okay,” He managed to choke out. He squeezed his eyes shut even though there were no tears welling in them and tried not to choke on the death around him too. Tried not to drown in the ache in his chest. “Okay.”

(It was a shot to the back that got him. Maggots infested under his skin within hours of his death. Edward was right next to him the entire time.

Just another person’s blood coating his hands, he told himself.

He didn’t sleep well that night.)

* * *

Hell, Ed decides one final time, is this entire fucking civil war.

Hell is the blood under his fingernails, is the bruises that get stacked on top of each other. Is the cuts that never get a chance to heal before being torn open once more.

Hell is the muck and rot and the taste of ashes in the back of his throat as they go through and burn all the bodies in the trenches to prevent disease. Is the sickness spreading anyway. Is knowing when you die you’ll burn like the rest of them, even if burning is pointless.

Hell is learning how to remain silent among the dead as Ishvalans with guns and knives and more move through the trenches, his camp having been moved back a line already. Hell is trying to convince himself that walking out with his hands held away from him, no weapon in sight, was a bad idea.

Hell is taking back the line single handedly and being congratulated for it, is his commanding officer putting in a good word for him to be moved up a rank.

Hell is thinking that, when all of this is over, all that will be left of him is a burned up husk. Is knowing that he’s already burning from the inside out and  _ welcoming  _ it with open arms.

* * *

He’s fourteen and his name is Edward Trigham and he’s a normal soldier. Young as fuck, yes, but officially? He has no unique qualities. If one were to look at his file they would be left wondering why, exactly, the military had decided to deploy him of all people.

His name is Edward Trigham and he is a normal soldier. 

That had been the  _ deal. _

(He should’ve thought better about making a deal with a monster, because now he’s pinned to a wall and  _ wrath  _ is drowning him.)

* * *

His name is Edmus Elric and he’s a sniper.

He’s posted just in the desert, and his automail  _ burns.  _ He wants to rake his nails over it, wants to tear off his skin, wants to  _ scream  _ as it chars his skin. It’s blistering hot during the day and freezing cold during the night and he thinks it might actually kill him. Thinks one day the nerves will have finally had enough and short circuit on him.

(He almost wishes it would. The guilt for that thought keeps getting less and less every time he thinks about it. 

He hopes the war ends soon. He doesn’t know how much longer he can last before he does it himself.)

He’s a sniper, but his eyes aren’t built for it. He tries to tell his commanding officer that- that he’s never had the best sight to begin with, and the heat sizzling off the sands makes it so much  _ worse-  _ but he’s just told to suck it up. He better find a way to get over that, they tell him.

Ed wants to kill them.

(he doesn’t- of  _ course  _ he doesn’t. He’s their pet mutt and they all know it. He’ll dance naked for them if it means his family is safe.)

So, instead of tearing the skin off the General’s face like he wants to, Ed turns his attention to alchemy. He composes an array that he paints next to his eyes because he knows they aren’t making threats lightly. It sharpens his sight, lets him zoom in as if he’s looking through a gun’s scope and makes everything so much clearer. 

It also gives him such bad migraines to use that he can’t move at night without white hot spears of pain trying to kill him, but that’s secondary in the face of his kill count. As Edmus, as a sniper, it’s the second highest in his unit.

He actually is sick, when he finds that out. Stumbles out of the food tent and throws up everything he’d just eaten into the sands. Sits and heaves long after everyone else has gone back to their duties. Heaves till not even stomach acid comes up anymore.

He knew he was a monster, a blood traitor. Knew that he’d killed thousands upon thousands of his own kin. Knew the monster with  _ wrath  _ swimming in his veins and him were the same.

But it’s one thing to  _ know  _ it and another entirely to have it shoved into his face like he should be  _ proud  _ of it.

* * *

Henry’s hands were harsh as he buried the tweezers into Edward’s arm, the older man’s jaw clenched, practically creaking, as he glared down at the thirteen year old. The bullet wasn’t  _ that  _ hard to get out, Ed thought. He didn’t voice it.

_ “Blood traitor,”  _ the field doctor hissed at him as he continued to dig around, pressing against the bullet more than once but not pulling it out yet. The Ishvalan had a heavy accent to it, and it would be comforting to hear his mother tongue if the words weren’t acid being sprayed at him.  _ “Kin killer. Godless monster. Godless  _ ** _demon.”_ **

Ed bore it silently, teeth sunk into his cheek and flooding his mouth with copper as he stared straight ahead. 

_ “Ishvala will never accept your blood soaked hands, will never allow you to pass into her sacred lands. Not with your stained soul,”  _ Henry continued, fingers shaking as he finally took the time to remove the bullet. White hot pain was racing it’s way along the left side of his body and Edward had to bite down even harder to keep from  _ screaming. “You are a disgrace to the Ishvalan blood in your veins.” _

_ “Yes,”  _ Ed agreed tightly, Ishvalan wavering on his tongue. He felt woozy with blood loss. The doctor seemed to make everything so much more painful. For his crimes, Ed knew. For all his kin he’s killed. He deserved it.  _ He deserved it. _

That didn’t mean he didn’t want it to  _ stop. _

_ “I’m a disgrace on my family name and on my blood- I  _ ** _know,” _ ** he choked on the words, metal fingers clenching and unclenching in the spotless blanket he’d been laid on when he was brought in. Copper sits heavy on his tongue. He hopes there’s no blood on his teeth.  _ “I know, I know, I know, you don’t need to tell me  _ ** _I know.”_ **

“Good,” Henry spits, finally speaking Amestrian. The language was crisp and cold on the man’s tongue. Ishvalan fit him much better. It almost made him want to laugh- he was one half Ishvalan and the language sang to him but Amestrian was always the one that he’d been better with words in. Henry’s great grandfather was the only Ishvalan in his family and yet the language seemed to almost flow from his mouth.

Ed squeezes his eyes shut, entire body locking up as he’s stitched up. His mouth is probably a mess of red, probably looks like his arm. Coated in blood.

He passes out not long after. His nightmares are painted in blood, just like the rest of him.

(Henry’s charged with treason the next day, having been caught in both helping enemy Ishvalans and sabotaging Amestrian soldiers through incorrect or needlessly painful dressings of their wounds. 

Ed’s own injury is used as an example of it. He wants to  _ scream. _

The Colonel in charge of their division places Ed on the firing squad set to execute Henry. The man makes it seem like it’s a  _ reward,  _ like he can get  _ justice-  _ like he can get  _ revenge  _ for the pain Henry rightfully inflicted on him. Like he should be  _ happy  _ he could possibly be the one to fire the lethal shot.

The doctor’s allowed to face them when he’s placed in front of them, is allowed to look at his executor’s faces as they all fire. He stares at Edward the entire time. The recoil he feels when fires lets him know that his shot wasn’t a blank.

He wishes he could pretend that he didn’t know that his shot was the one to kill him. His eyes aren’t bad enough that he can’t see the hole where he aimed being the only one lethal enough to kill the man.)

* * *

It’s a bad idea, Ed knows. A horrible idea. He shouldn’t do it. Should listen to the voice in the back of his head that sounds suspiciously like Teacher telling him to  _ spin the fuck around and never think of even  _ ** _trying _ ** _ to do this again. _

He should listen to the feeling in his gut that tells him this is a horribly stupid fucking idea.

He won’t. What does he have left to lose? (Famous last words.)

He steels himself, and walks into the tent, rapping metal knuckles on the pole keeping the thing standing as he does. Henderson jerks around at the sound, blue eyes narrowing in on Edward as the man went ramrod straight.

_ You’re quite bad at hiding that look, you know,  _ Ed tells him, face impassive and tone bland. Conversational. It would’ve made his skin crawl, his words, if he didn’t already know worse things. The Gate whispered in his sleep, another man being unable to remove his eyes from his body was the least of his worries.

(Ed wasn’t stupid, and nor was he naive or in any way innocent. He knew he gained looks wherever he went, and he knew that quite a lot of those looks weren’t because of his automail or his age. There were more than a few sick people who didn’t care if someone was young in the world, and war tends to bring the worst out of people.

Henderson, Ed knew, was one of these people. Maybe, under normal circumstances- away from this fucked up war, away from the bodies and blood and stench of death- Henderson would’ve never looked at him that way. Maybe in another world he wouldn’t even have taught himself to be constantly aware of his surroundings to such a degree that he even noticed the looks. Maybe in another world he wouldn’t have qi sensing to confirm what those looks meant.

Maybe in another world Ed wouldn’t have gotten his own stupid idea from that look. 

Henderson was an alchemist- not a state registered one but an alchemist nonetheless. He crafted his life around alchemy’s laws, and the biggest law there was was the law of  _ equivalent exchange.  _

Ed wondered how many favors he could get just for the simple act of giving them what they wanted.)

Henderson doesn’t deny anything when Ed lays it out. Doesn’t stop him. Looks regretful for it to end when it’s all over.

_ Equivalent Exchange,  _ Ed tells him, just as blandly as when he first walked in.  _ You owe me.  _ He can see the almost fucking  _ hungry  _ look in the man’s Amestrian blue eye when the implications of those words sink in. It’s almost enough for Ed to clap his hands together and to deconstruct his own chest. He feels dirty.

_ You owe me,  _ he repeats when he leaves. He wishes that he hadn’t already used his shower for the next two weeks. There’s an insistent  _ wrong wrong horrid wrong unclean unclean  _ crawling around his skin. It’s sharp enough to drown out the Gate’s own  _ leeches, maggots, rot, decay you belong to me, with me.  _ If the thing drowning it out was more pleasant, then Ed might’ve actually enjoyed it.

Instead he’s just disgusted with himself. He regrets what he did. He doesn’t want to do it again.  _ He doesn’t want to do it again.  _ But-

_ But but but but- _

He’s in a  _ war _ . This is the easiest way to gain favors that he knows he can cash in, that he knows will be fulfilled. He regrets it but he knows himself well enough by now to know that that won’t stop him from doing it again. How is it any different from what he’d done with the Brigadier General?

_ For Winry, for Alphonse, for Izumi and Sig. To make it back to them. To make it back  _ ** _home_ ** _ . _

_ Endure endure endure. _

* * *

He doesn’t deserve to survive out here, Ed knows. Doesn’t deserve to survive through all the blood and sickness and death- he doesn’t deserve to  _ survive  _ while all he’s doing is killing his own  _ innocent people. _

He doesn’t deserve any of it. He should lay down his gun, should sit above the trenches and wait for his people to have their revenge against him. He  _ should.  _

_ He should he should he should.  _

But.

There are people waiting for him to come home. 

Winry, Al, Izumi and Sig- they might not want him anymore after all this is over. They might kick him out when he tries to go home. Ed knows that.  _ Expects  _ that.  _ Deserves  _ that.

But Winry still writes to him.  _ Often.  _ Writes to him about everything that’s been happening outside of the war- outside of the constant scream of gunfire and the heavy reek of death. Writes to him about how Al’s doing- how he’s getting more and more lucid by the day. Writes to him about her new girlfriend, about university, about the apparently very hot girl across the hall from her who carries a  _ sword  _ around with her.

She still  _ writes  _ even when all Ed can offer back are some shitty papers with blood dried on the corners stuffed into a too-small envelope. She still  _ writes to him _ even when she’s bound to know he’s out there _ killing his own kin.  _

It’s enough to make him cling to the hope that maybe-  _ maybe-  _ when it’s all over he’ll be allowed to go home. Maybe he’ll be allowed to be  _ happy. _

So, they might kick him out when he goes home, but he’s  _ going  _ to go home. He clutches Winry’s letters tight to his chest at night and repeats that like it’ll make it true, repeats it till he even maybe begins to believe it.

He wants to go  _ home,  _ damn it all to hell. He just wants to go  _ home. _

* * *

Ed has to consciously force himself to steadily breath through his mouth to keep from hurling. He trembles, teeth catching on his lip every once in a while before he reminds himself to  _ breathe.  _

_ In, out. In, out. In. Out. In. Out. _

_ Breathe.  _

His teeth caught his lip again, startling him out of the rhythm. He shook his head, tried to still his shaking as he raised his rifle to his shoulder. He ignored the  _ (deaddeaddead)  _ bodies behind him as he brushed a finger against his temple. A small spark of alchemy later and he could see his target across the plaza as easily as if he were right next to them.

Ed swallowed thickly, rapidly calculating just how he had to shoot to make sure the deaths that would stain his hands were as painless as possible. Were as quick as he could make them.

His mission was vague, given to him by the General sometime long after night had fallen. Infiltrate the city, set up a nest, and kill the city’s biggest religious figure in broad daylight along with as many others as he could before setting off the signal for the rest of his unit to storm the place.

It was a warning to the Ishvalans- to the  _ desert rats.  _ Amestris was coming, and your chance to run had long been lost. Your warriors cannot protect you.

He’d been given extra rations for it, as well as a much needed  _ hot- god  _ it’d been so long since he’d had a hot water, dispite being in a fucking  _ desert- _ shower.

It didn’t make any of it worth it in the slightest. The lives that he was crushing weren’t worth more  _ shitty food  _ and a  _ shower.  _ He’d felt slimy when the General had clapped his hand over Ed’s shoulder, qi showing clear as day that he was happy to have so many die.

(On his particularly bad days, Ed liked to try and console himself with the knowledge that at least he wasn’t  _ that  _ type of monster. Much like the extra rations and hot shower, it didn’t matter in the slightest because he was still  _ killing his own people. _

He wondered when that would finally break him. He wonders if it already has.)

A child laughing down below snapped him out of his thoughts, brought him back to the present. He fought not to hurl as it hit him once more that he would be killing dozens with a simple bullet and array. Hit him that he was killing  _ children. _

(An image of Al, small- practically dwarfed in the large hospital bed that wasn’t meant for a kid-  _ Al small and defenseless, practically comatose because Ed had  _ ** _fucked up again_ ** _ \-  _ flashed through his mind.)

Swallowing again, throat clicking, he squeezed the trigger.

Immediately, screams and explosions lit the grounds, blood and gore splattering the walls as the array carved into his bullet ignited itself the moment it was buried into his target's chest, the moment it scraped against their very soul. Ed swallowed back bile, taking a sharp breath in through his nose as he slammed his eyes shut in an attempt to shut it all out. It turned out to be a mistake, though, as the reek of blood and bodily fluids invaded his senses and he threw up anyway, shaking and  _ cold, so cold why was he so fucking  _ ** _cold_ ** _ -? _

Ed stumbled towards the window, rifle sliding from numb fingers to clatter against the ground. The noise was barely heard over the screams and cries outside. (He almost wished the gun would go off- would shoot him in the back or the leg or the arm or the  _ head.  _ Somewhere  _ lethal.  _ He hated this. He hated himself for causing this all  _ so fucking much.) _

The flare went off in his hands. He didn’t remember grabbing it, much less setting it off. Gunfire howled in the distance. Ed sunk down against the wall, not even considering moving away. Let the Ishvalans find his nest, let them find him and finally  _ kill him. _

_Little Al-che-mist, _the Truth murmured to him, tone mournful, tone gut-wrenchingly _sad. _Ed would never understand why they were so gentle with him, despite him being a sinner. Despite him being a _murderer._ _Little Al-che-mist, just rest. Sleep. Rest. Little Al-che-mist, don’t you want to rest?_

The Gate coiled tighter around him, settling on his shoulders, into his bones. It pumped through his blood, racing through his veins and soothing over his skin. It whispered to him, sinking down down down into his mind and thoughts as he started to drift. Not even the gunfire could keep him up, not even the screams could tether him to the world.

Gods above (gods he’s never believed in, gods he never would believe in) he was so  _ so  _ tired.

He just wanted to  _ rest. _

For once, he let the Gate’s presence sooth him, instead of letting the horrors it inevitably brought to sink in. Let it coax him to  _ sleep.  _

He was so tired of all the blood around him.

(he’s promoted to Lieutenant Colonel within the week, commended for his bravery in going straight into the rats nest unflinchingly. It was obviously a test, to see how loyal he was. Or maybe they just liked breaking him. Ed doesn’t know, doesn’t have the energy to even feel sick over it.

He wonders if that means he’s getting used to it- used to all the blood and gore and death surrounding him from all sides. Used to be rewarded for acting like a monster. Used to  _ being  _ a monster.

He wonders if that makes him even more of a monster.

The empty feeling carved into his chest purrs a hateful  _ yes.) _

* * *

After Marcus- after Luise and Henry and everyone else Ed has ever managed to get even slightly close to in the trenches, even if it’s ‘close’ in a horrible way, ends up fucking  _ dead,  _ Ed makes himself a promise.

_ Never again,  _ he whispers into the night, to the unfamiliar sky that burns with a thousand familiar stars.  _ Never again. Only me. Never again. _

He whispers it over and over again, until his voice is hoarse and rough and his throat is aching with it all. Whispers it long after he should’ve gone to bed. Whispers it even as his demons get closer and closer, closing him in on all sides. He mouths it when he can’t speak any more, when there’s a padlock on his tongue and his voice is trapped inside. Mouths it till the sky starts to lighten, the sun rising. Mouths it even as he sets out on his patrol, unable to stop.

He repeats it like a mantra, like saying it- mouthing it- will make it  _ true. _

_ Never again, never again, never again. _

Over and over and over again, he promises himself. He won’t get close to another person again, not in that way. He won’t lay himself bare to someone else when they all keep  _ dying. _

He can’t take it. He doesn’t think he’d survive losing someone else. Doesn’t think he’d be able to convince himself to not stand up in the next shoot out and just wait for the bullets to show everyone how hollow he was.

_ He can’t  _ ** _take it._ **

A promise.  _ Don’t forget. _

_ Never again never again never again. _

* * *

He wonders if news of his status reaches Dublith. Wonders if Al and Winry know how much blood stains his hands. Wonders if Sig and  _ Izumi  _ know.

He wonders if they hate him.

(He hopes not. It’s a selfish thought- he deserves to be  _ loathed  _ by them. Deserves to have Al cut him out of the family, to disown him in the eyes of Ishvala. Deserves to be  _ cursed  _ for killing so many of his own  _ kin.  _ He deserves it all but-

He wants to be selfish. Just once. He already hates himself so much, he doesn’t think he could handle it if they hated him too.)

* * *

Ed drags in a deep breath, holding the child’s hand to his chest so they can try and mimic him. The child tried, snot and tears dripping down their face and they clung to him, small hands knotted up in his uniform. They tried, but their chest stuttered, ribs creaking and twitching under the effort, cutting off any hope of a steady breath.

_ “Mma… mmma…”  _ They whimpered, blood muddling the woods as they sobbed and trembled.  _ “Mma.. mma!” _

_ Shh,  _ Ed took in another measured breath, letting go of the hand against his chest to smooth back the child’s blood matted hair from their eyes.  _ Shhh.  _

They continued to cry out for their mother, eyes wide and desperate and filled with pain, filled with panic. Ed’s chest ached, his next breath a fight to keep steady. He pressed his hands together, soothed back their hair again, ran his fingers through it.

He hummed, a soft tune his mother had once used to lull him to sleep, and carefully tugged the child into his lap, rocked with them as they continued to cry.  _ Shhh.  _

He ran his fingers through their hair long after they’d relaxed, long after they’d gone limp. Ran his fingers through their hair long after the alchemy had already sparked off, had already done its job.

He hummed, a soft thing, long after he knew he should be heading back to the camp. Hummed long after he knew the others would start looking for him. Hummed and finally let his breathing hitch, when the tune skipped off. 

Hitch for the dead child in his arms. Hitch for the young Ishvalans with handprints of their hips and lethal injuries littering their bodies. Hitch for the life that should’ve never seen the horrors of war.

He didn’t cry, couldn’t cry, eyes always-  _ always-  _ stubbornly dry, but he let his breathing hitch. Let his hands shake as he tried to continue with the broken hum. Let himself  _ grieve  _ for once.

He cradled them gently, when he stood up. Cradled them gently as he carefully dug the grave, not willing to set them down. Not willing to let go of the too-little, too-light weight in his arms.

He cradled them gently, when he lowered them down. Carded his fingers through white hair once more before he stepped back, filling in the grave. His voice was soft when he spoke, the long familiar prayer falling from his lips like he had said it thousands of times, instead of just the once when his mother died.

He didn’t pray for himself, didn’t pray like he was praying to a god he believed in. Instead, he prayed for the child, for their safe return back to their god. Prayed that Ishvala may welcome them with open arms. 

He didn’t believe in any god- hadn’t for a long, long time- but the child had. Ishvalans did. Believed it wholeheartedly, with every ounce of faith they could. They didn’t treat god like some kind of miracle worker, like some kind of higher being that would forever help them, but they did believe they were there. Did believe that, in the end, Ishvala always had a path for them, but that they had to be the ones to reach out and grasp it. That they were the ones that had to put one foot after the other.

So Edward didn’t believe in any gods, never would, but he would pray for the little kid with a too-short life. He could do that much. He owed them that much.

He would pray for them.

* * *

It’s a shot to the chest that takes him down, a shot from a little terrified boy who had somehow managed to smother his own qi enough that Ed doesn’t even notice him until the shot goes off and suddenly everything is ringing and thudding and his chest is on  _ fire. _

He falls, gravity dragging him down, and it’s instinct that has his own pistol going off, aimed at the child and Edward is trembling, shaking, falling apart because the boy’s qi bursts out and Edward can recognize the split second of gut-wrenching horror before it all goes  _ blank. _

He tries to cry out but blood bubbles over his lips and he’s falling apart, he can tell, on the floor and bleeding out and there’s shouts around him, hands on him, but all he can think about is how the boy looked so  _ afraid,  _ gleaming red eyes locked on him like a frightened animal and-

His vision grays at the edges, his hands shakes even if his automail  _ shouldn’t  _ because it’s not a real limb but it does anyway because he just killed a child, a little boy that had looked no older than five and he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to burn those red red eyes out of his mind.

The Gate’s call is thunderous now, the nothing space looming for him, a void threatening to swallow him whole and-

It’s gone, a heartstopping moment of  _ nothing _ being  _ everything everything  _ and Ed  _ screams. _

His heart pounds, his head aches, he’s trembling trembling trembling and he  _ can’t. _

He’s on a bed. The sun is high in the sky. There is no  _ nothing nothing nothing  _ threatening to drown but he still aches and when he turns his head-

_ Wrath  _ looms.

* * *

He’s fifteen and carving arrays into bullets when he first meets her.

“You’re awfully young,” she comments, qi sad but tone anything but. “I wasn’t sure if the others were telling the truth, when they said that you were underage.”

Ed can’t really stop the bitter twist of his lips when he holds out his hand. The moment the pocket watch had entered his hands by law he’d become an adult. It no longer counted as ‘underage’, even if no one but him and the monsters knew that. 

She’s got the Amestrian blond hair but, Ed absently notes, her eyes are brown instead of blue. 

She hands her rifle over without a moment's hesitation and it takes seconds for Ed to calculate the right size and density for the bullets. He presses his hands together before tapping his fingers to the pile of materials at his side. The sniper watches him silently as he coaxes the bullets to form. Ed can’t help but wonder at her story. Her eyes are tired but there’s a drive there, a burning fire that tells him she’s not here for nothing.

He’s tempted to ask. It’s not an unusual question, what with everyone who’s at this outpost being stuck with each other whether they liked it or not. They were secluded and it made it a common practice to ask about one another’s stories.

“Riza Hawkeye,” She finally greets once Ed’s handed back the gun and the newly made bullets. He just nods, knowing that even if he tried he wouldn’t be able to speak. His nightmares lurked too close here.

He wants to ask her story, but he doesn’t. All he knows is she’s got a fire in her eyes and it’s the thing that led her to being the best sniper the military’s got.

He isn’t sure he wants to get to know the only person to beat him in the amount of Ishvalans they’ve killed. He isn’t sure he wants to get to know the fire that could burn him.

* * *

Edward doesn’t really expect to see her again after that. Soldiers got swapped out often between outposts, so the likelihood of her staying and not just passing through was low.

Apparently, statistics did not apply to Riza Hawkeye.

She sits next to him during the lunch hour, expertly avoiding his scribbling out designs and coded notes scattered around the table as she starts eating. He can see her studying the circles out of the corner of his eye, but it’s less like she wants to copy them or try them out herself and more that she’s simply curious.

She doesn’t even bother trying to decipher his notes, but Ed switches up the code halfway through writing them out anyway, paranoia skittering across his skin.

Riza Hawkeye doesn’t speak the entire time, eating her lunch in silence and letting him work through his theories and hypothesis without interruption.

It’s near the end of the hour silent that Ed can’t quite take it.

“Why did you sit next to me?'' His voice is low, scratchy, tone a carefully constructed bland. It does nothing to disquise the hostility there.

She doesn’t answer for a long minute, finishing up her food and gathering it up to get rid of the garbage.

“No one should be alone, not even you.”

* * *

It happens more often after that, Hawkeye showing up at his table when their lunch hours align. Ed tells himself that he leaves a space clear for her so she won’t mess up any of his notes moving them to clear it. It falls flat, even in his own head. He’s never quite mastered the art of lying to himself.

More and more often, he finds himself rattling off his theories and hypotheses out loud when she’s there, simply going through the formulas and equations to see if he has any mistakes. It’s not unlike what he used to do with Winry, on those nights where neither could manage to stay under long enough to get any real rest.

Unlike with Winry, he keeps it all in code, a spoken mangled mass of all the languages he’s ever learned with enough slang splashed through that anyone that  _ did  _ know any of the words still wouldn’t be able to make heads or tails of it all.

The written portion of it is a code style he’d bastardized off his own father’s, all the symbols in his father’s strange tongue. He doesn’t trust her, can’t-  _ won’t, never again never again-  _ let himself trust her.

Despite that, he still finds himself opening his mouth around her.

His own talking seemed to have opened her up, too, and when Ed’s not rattling off advanced alchemical theories, Hawkeye fills the silence with her own stories. Her voice is low and steady, easy to tune out if he wanted to.

He finds, more and more often, that he doesn’t want to.

He learns, through listening to her, that she has a childhood friend- a pyromaniac, if she’s to be believed- who was studying alchemy from her father. He learns that she wasn’t ever close to her father, but she was still sad when he finally succumbed to his illness. 

He learns that she joined the army because of her childhood friend, and she intends to find him.

He learns that she wants a dog, when the war is finally over. Wants to get a puppy and an apartment in the city and wants to try out a bakery one of the girls in the academy recommended to her.

He learns that she graduated the academy a few months early, when the fighting closer to the southern borders got worse, learns that she was carted off to their outpost because she couldn’t bring herself to shoot a little kid. Learns that she hates this god forsaken war just as much- if not more- than he does.

He doesn’t trust her, he’s not  _ allowed  _ to trust her, but more and more he finds himself listening.

He doesn’t trust her, but part of him wants to.

* * *

She sets the computer down next to him a month and a half after she joined him at his table, the old piece of shit looking completely out of place in the harsh desert.

He forces himself to not jump out of his skin at the quiet  _ bang  _ it makes when it hits the table. It wasn’t even that loud. He needs to stop jumping at shadows.

“I don’t use it,” she tells him, which he thinks is bullshit but doesn’t say. The laptop may be old but it was obviously well taken care of. “You’re smart, especially to be in the military at your age. You shouldn’t waste it.”

When he doesn’t move to grab the laptop, she nudges it closer to him. “Use it. You should have something to look forward to after the war ends. The connection isn’t the best, but I’ve gotten Colonel Fosker to make it so you can do online classes.”

She apparently thinks that that’s the end of the conversation, because she finally sits down and starts eating her own lunch. Ed hesitates before gathering up his notes and scribbled designs and opening up the laptop.

True to her word, by the time Edward has to go back out on patrol, he’s already gotten enrolled back into the classes he’d been in before he’d been drafted. He was able to pick up where he left off.

Ed doesn’t think he can cry anymore- wasn’t sure his body would ever let him- but he was pretty sure if he could he would’ve burst into tears.

He doesn’t trust Riza Hawkeye, he  _ doesn’t,  _ but he’s grateful that he knows her. He doesn’t trust her, but he thinks that he might be starting to.

* * *

It’s after they’ve settled into a routine during their lunch hours that Ed realizes that he’s learned the answer to the first question he thought about when he met Riza Hawkeye.

He’s learned that the fire, that burning  _ drive,  _ that he can see in her eyes is her personal promise to herself to find and help her friend that was somewhere out there, out in the harsh desert alone. 

He’s learned that that friend is hopeless when it comes to baking, but that he tries anyway. Has learned that he’s a total nerd, but will never admit it. Has learned that he only wants to  _ help  _ and probably has no idea what he’s getting himself into, joining the war.

He’s learned that she’ll do anything she can to reach him. And that includes killing.

He’s learned that that burning fire is also countless other promises to herself, promises to not be lost and swept up in the war. To not forget who she is in all the blood and death and gore- in all the misery and pain. Has learned that that burning fire is her way of latching onto something to survive the sandstorm.

He’s learned that the fire in her eyes is as much a drive, a fuel for her to use, as it is a sharp, white hot hatred for the war she’d found herself in. An all consuming hatred for the bloodshed and tears and  _ pain _ that this war seems to be made of.

He’s learned all of this- his answer and countless other answers to questions unasked- and so their interaction should’ve tampered off, shouldn’t it have? He’s already satisfied his curiosity. He doesn’t have to leave a spot open for her anymore. He  _ shouldn’t. _

He shouldn’t, but he does. He knows countless facts about Riza Hawkeye but she knows nothing about him. Sure, she knows he’s smart, knows that he’s good at alchemy, but she doesn’t  _ know  _ him. Not in the way she’s let him know her.

She’s laid herself bare and Ed’s thinking of turning his back on that. That’s not  _ equivalent.  _

It’s not  _ equivalent  _ and Edward, the moment he realized that, felt the Truth picking at him like a scab, itching and hissing underneath his skin. It’s not fair, not  _ right,  _ to let her stick her neck out and not respond in kind.

It’s not  _ equivalent,  _ and Ed can’t just leave it like that.

(And if he’s starting to like their talks, starting to like having someone listen without judgement, starting to like their easy companionship, well- there’s no one around but him to know.)

* * *

If anyone asked, Ed would blame the change in routine to having figured out a new branch of alchemy he could follow and wanting to have someone to bounce his thoughts off.

If anyone asked, Ed would claim that he’s simply looking for tips on how to shoot better. Looking for advice on how to deal with the stronger kickback his new rifle has.

If anyone asked, Ed would claim that he’s bored, and simply wanted to find some entertainment.

If anyone asked, Edward would not say the truth. He would not say  _ I saw you in my dreams, I saw you dead, I say you burned. I saw you, and it scared me. _

If anyone asked, Ed would not say  _ my mission went into overtime, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get the reek of gunpowder out of my nose. I don’t think I’ll ever forget what their faces looked like when I pulled the trigger. I don’t think I’ll ever forget what brain matter looks like splattered across sandstone. _

If anyone asked, Ed would not say  _ I let someone touch me again, let them do whatever they wanted to me for a favor. I told them they could. I told them that they owed me. I told them they could do it, so why does my skin feel so fuckin’  _ ** _dirty?_ **

If anyone asked, Ed would never say  _ I sometimes scare myself. I think I’m a monster. I think I should’ve been put down long ago, a sick dog that’s only suffering and causing others to suffer along with it. _

If anyone asked, Ed would never say  _ sometimes I think about going out into the sands with a gun and ending this all. _

If anyone asked, Ed would never say  _ I miss you and I miss our talks and I miss that you’ve never asked anything of me and I miss how you don’t make me want to cut out my own heart a fraction as much as everyone else. _

Hawkeye doesn’t ask. She takes one look at his face- or maybe his eyes, he’s not sure, can’t tell through the  _ leeches, maggots, rot, you belong to me, with me, come to me  _ settling heavy in his lungs, over his skin- and sets aside her dismantled gun before scooting back from the fire and patting the space in front of her.

Ed’s shoulders loosen at the clear invitation, loosen at the easy acceptance. He forces himself not to collapse in front of her, forces himself to settle down carefully and to remain relaxed but not limp.

She starts speaking, voice still low but tone refusing to let him tune out. Her hands slide through his hair, shorter than it had been before being drafted, and start to comb out sections of it with her fingers, braiding it in sections once it was free of tangles.

She doesn’t ask him why he’d suddenly decided to seek her out after months of only seeing each other during lunch hour, doesn’t ask why there’s bits of blood in his hair. Doesn’t ask why he can’t bring himself to utter so much as a sound as he sits in front of her.

She doesn’t ask  _ what happened to you?  _

She doesn’t ask  _ did you kill someone? _

They both know the answers. They’ve both lived through them. They don’t need to tear the truth open, to force their blood to spill out with their honestly. They both know that truth already, and so she doesn’t ask.

Instead, she talks. 

_ He came to me in the middle of the night, once.  _ She tells him.  _ He wanted me to go swimming with him. Didn’t take no for an answer. He wanted me to have fun. _

Her voice is fond as she speaks, wistfulness curled at the edges. 

_ He dragged me over to his car, this old beat up convertible, and drove me to the pool. It was in the better off part of town, with all of the unnecessary extra expenses scattered everywhere. I’d never felt so out of place in my life, driving through those neighborhoods. Did you know they didn’t have a spot of grafite on any of their walls? _

_ We broke in, obviously. He pushed me over the fence and I pulled him along with me. Nearly shattered my wrist when I landed in a heap on the cement. They had a hot tub, with adjustable jets. It was paradise. I never wanted to leave. _

_ I don’t know how long we stayed there, just fooling around. Someone came and found us, though. The manager of the place, if I had to guess. We didn’t ask, just booked it away, got the hell out of dodge. We climbed into his car, all sopping wet, and just laughed for probably ten minutes as he struggled to even get the key in the ignition. It was the most fun I’d had in years. _

_ He dropped me off back at home and hugged me tight before he left. It was probably around four a.m. by the time I finally fell asleep. My father never found out. That’s probably my favorite memory of him. It was the most carefree he ever was. _

She leaned back, fingers sliding through his bangs and brushing them out of his face. The fire danced light along his skin as he breathed in deep, let it all out slowly. It danced in her eyes when he finally looked up at her.

_ Share my tent, tonight,  _ she tells him, hand settled on his right shoulder, on cold, unrelenting metal.  _ It’s probably hard for you to stay warm at night. Share my tent. _

_ Ok,  _ the sound doesn’t make it past his lips, past his tongue, but she smiles nonetheless, helping to pull him to his feet.  _ Ok. _

He leans on her, taking weight off his left leg. She wraps her arms around his shoulders and takes him back to her tent. Her body’s warmer than it has any right to be, in the dropping temperatures. He’s not sure if he’d be able to stop himself from curling up against her in his sleep.

_ Ok.  _

He doesn’t bother pretending he’s not cold, and doesn’t bother letting his body choose what it wants once he’s blissfully unconscious. Instead, he presses against her from the start, curls as close to the incredible heat as he dares and lets her do the rest.

_ Ok. _

Hawkeye doesn’t remove her arm from around his shoulders, tucking him in closer and relaxing down into the uncomfortably thin bedding. She hums, breathing already starting to deepen, and doesn’t say anything for the rest of the night.

_ Ok. _

How could Edward ever say  _ no  _ to that?

How could he ever leave?

_ Ok.  _

* * *

“I got my doctorate,” the words feel numb on his tongue, his whole body feels paralyzed.

Hawkeye-  _ call me Riza, Ed-  _ blinks up at him, face puzzled before disbelief takes over. “You’re kidding.”

“No,” the words sound faint, even to him. “They were offly fucking nice about the whole at war thing. Let me do a video call and everything.”

“I gave you my laptop not even eight months ago.”

“I know.”

“ _ How-”  _ she cut herself off, face smoothing out as she sighs. “You’re going to be the death of me. You’ve got your doctorate.”

“Yeah,” he swallowed thickly, heard his heart beating rapidly in his ears. He wasn’t sure how many hours he’d put into his degree, how many hours he’d put into  _ school.  _ He still wasn’t sure  _ how  _ he’d gotten the doctorate. He’d put together his thesis and slides in a month, max. Most of that time was spent sleep deprived, typing away the hours before his next mission or patrol and between fitful, nightmare filled crashes that didn’t deserve to be called sleep.

He was pretty sure either he’d been given a miracle, or the people at the university were fucking  _ idiots. _

Probably both. He was going with both.

They’d given him a fucking  _ doctorate. _

He leaned against Hawkeye to stop himself from collapsing.

Maybe when all this was over- the war seemed to be coming to a head, so that seemed to be  _ soon-  _ he and Alphonse could go out and get the degrees they’d always dreamed of having, when they were young and stupid and wanting to give their mother a better life. Wanting to escape the poverty that had struck Resembool.

Maybe they could go out and travel. Winry was friends with a prince from Xing, maybe they could go there. Maybe they could go see the ocean by Aerugo, or the Winter Solstice Festival in Drachma. Maybe they could learn thousands of other types of alchemy without the bitter tang of blood soiling it.

Maybe they could go out and  _ help  _ people. Alkahestry, Ed knew, was focused on healing and was basically a cleaner version of alchemy. It was what their father had taught them, and even though those memories had been tainted by his father’s hateful eyes and broad back as he left, Edward still loved it.

Maybe, when all of this was over,  _ maybe  _ he could take Alphonse and show him everything Hohenheim hadn’t gotten to.

Maybe, when all this was over, Ed could turn around and do some  _ good  _ for once in his life.

* * *

‘Soon’ it turned out, wouldn’t be for another two years.

Order 3066 was issued February 28, 1908. Edward stares down at the order papers, a sick feeling churning his stomach.

State Alchemists were called to war, to the front lines.

Ed breathed in, and tasted ash on his tongue.

It wasn’t a war, not anymore.

It was an extermination.

* * *

“This is murder,” For the first time since he’s met her, Hawkeye’s face mirrored the sick, gut-wrentching horror of her qi. “This is  _ genocide.” _

Her voice choked off, knuckles clenched white over her sides.

“We’re meant to  _ protect  _ them. We’re  _ soldiers. _ We’re meant to  _ protect  _ our citizens, why are we  _ murdering  _ them?” She stared vacantly down at the sands, jaw clenched and shoulders shaking.

Ed stayed silent, swallowing his own horror and bottling it up inside him. His fingers tightened around the watch in his pocket, so tight the dragon carved in the front imprinted itself into his palm.

_ Don’t. Forget. _

He didn’t have an answer for her. Not one that wouldn’t have him shot at dawn for even daring to think of.

The Gate whispered in his dreams, the Truth leaned over his shoulder in the day. His nightmares twisted, the horrid nothing-place filling his mind and muddling his thoughts. He saw people he’d never met dying at his hands and dying for him and saving him and killing him. He saw his country rising and falling, saw his homeland being torn apart.

He’s seen himself, in the center of the circle, trying to bring it all back. Trying and failing to make things right.

(He’s seen himself, younger than he was in his life, trying to bring his mother back and crawling with only one leg to a suit of armor and giving up his arm to bind his brother to it. He’s seen himself, older than he is in his life, giving up his alchemy for that very same soul-bound suit of armor.)

He’d always assumed that those were simply nightmares, horrors his mind created with the influence of the Gate weighing heavy on it. He’d always assumed they weren’t  _ real. _

Now, with his orders and Hawkeye’s orders burned into his mind, he revises that theory.

They were real, and they were overlapping on him.

They were real, and they were licking at his heels.

* * *

“You’re a State Alchemist,” she didn’t look at him, still focused on reassembling her rifle. Ed rolled his watch between his hands.

“Yes.”

“You’re going to be sent to the front lines.”

“Yes.”

“You’re not allowed to die. That’s an order.”

Edward swallowed down the hysterical laughter that threatened to bubble up. She was a Sergeant, he was a Lieutenant Colonel. If anyone was meant to give orders, it was him.

“Yes sir.”

He picked up his pack and made for the jeeps. He had orders to follow.

He could still taste the ash in the back of his throat.

He was still burning from the inside out, his arrogance a brand on his soul.

He could still see brain matter splattered in a clouded mist across sandstone.

He would still endure.

_ For Winry, for Alphonse, for Sig and Izumi. I’ll come home. I’ll survive. _

_ Endure endure endure. _

* * *

_ “I hate it, I hate it so fucking much.” _

_ “Daniel? What’s happening?” _

_ “The new orders, the new fucking- this isn’t right, this isn’t right at all. You’re so lucky, you’ve got a desk job but Rell- Rell this is genocide. It’s like the kind of thing you find in a history book as a tragedy in history- it’s- it’s-” _

_ “What orders? Dan what’s- you’re not making sense wha-” _

_ “I can’t say, they won’t let me say it, we’re killing so many of them it’s a mess I never realized how much sand soaks up blood- there’s  _ kids  _ Rell, there’s kids and I  _ can’t _ -” _

Transcript of conversation between Corporal Daniel Munessi and Rellson Ceder(Civilian). Filed April 26 (1908).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can I cry??? I'm crying. ao3 apparently doesn't like how I format shit so I had to go manually write it all out.(Edit: I had to do it again!! it's not anymore fun the second time-)
> 
> that was fun
> 
> Thanks for reading this, reviews and kudos are awesome but honestly I'm mostly hung up on the fact some people actually click on my writing. 
> 
> this is only part one of this thing, and if everything goes to plan there should be three more parts after this. Four if inspiration hits and my plan goes up in flames. Don't know when the next part will come out, it might be in two weeks it might be in two months. This won't be abandoned, though, even if it decides to shred my sanity
> 
> bye,,


	2. Unraveling at the Seams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Abvinua:** I don’t. The military has done horrible things. I doubt they wouldn’t do it, if he showed enough potential. And Elric- he was strong. Unbelievably strong. On the same level of the likes of the Flame Alchemist and the Crimson Alchemist.
> 
> [pause]
> 
> **Sinous:** That’s high praise.
> 
> **Abvinua:** Or a terrible insult.
> 
> **Sinous:** [sigh] Yes, that too.
> 
> **Abvinua:** He was like them, too. Not mad, like Crimson was, or cold like Flame was, but he had a similar look in his eyes. Like broken glass, or maybe a cornered wild animal. A dog kicked one too many times. He was desperate.
> 
> [pause]
> 
> **Abvinua:** He was afraid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Should??? I explain my death??? no
> 
> Ok jokes aside, sorry this thing hasn't been updated in like,,, seven months?? eight??? I full on died y'all, it wasn't fun. My anxiety decided to spike up, which shoved my depression into gear, which cut off any and all of my motivation. Like I said, not fun. I'm in therapy now, which is helping, and I'm probably also going to get meds for this shit at some point too, so hopefully whenever the next chapter gets out, it won't be another half a year
> 
> Also sa;dhgodahite thank you all for all the nice comments!! Tbh those were what really kicked my ass into gear and got me writing this, y'all are just,, so nice. Also tho, just a warning- as much as I love them, comments begging for an update kinda just,,, does the opposite for me. Like I said guys, I've got anxiety, those comments tend to shove me into the 'freeze' mode. I suddenly feel a stupid amount of pressure to write but I don't want it to be bad but I need to write but-
> 
> Yeah. Comments along the lines of 'I can't wait for the continuation-' or whatever are fine, those are great!! but when asking for another chapter it just, does not work. This ain't an attack or anything, just a heads up. 
> 
> But yeah,, I'm back, have fun reading my garbage. Also for anyone who's read the first chapter when I first posted this story, I added some shit to it, doesn't change much but might make some things spat out on this make more sense

Excerpt of “The Golden Ghost”, an interview between Ellie Sinous(Host) and Warrant Officer Leana Abivnua (1 hour 12 min.). First aired Jan. 1 (1915).

**Sinous:** …Elric has long been an enigma to hunt down, both with his practically non-existent civilian paper trail and his depressingly small amount of filed military paperwork. I’ve been researching this enigma for quite a while, and I still have very little to say about him. What can you say about him?

**Abvinua: ** I knew Elric, actually. Personally. He was a very quiet boy. Bitter, too. I got the feeling he didn’t want to be there, in Ishval. I can’t say I blame him. Ishval was terrible. Bloody. 

**Sinous:** So he was a boy, then? Do you know how old he was?

**Abvinua: ** I don’t think I can give you an actual age, but he was in his teens. Fourteen, I’d say, though he did have automail, which I’ve heard can stunt growth, so I don’t know how reliable that is.

**Sinous: ** That does seem likely. While there is no age limit for State alchemists, I find it hard to believe the military would recruit an underage teen for their combatant team, no matter how skilled.

**Abvinua:** I don’t. The military has done horrible things. I doubt they  _ wouldn’t _ do it, if he showed enough potential. And Elric- he was strong. Unbelievably strong. On the same level of the likes of the Flame Alchemist and the Crimson Alchemist.

[pause]

**Sinous: ** That’s high praise.

**Abvinua:** Or a terrible insult.

**Sinous:** [sigh] Yes, that too.

**Abvinua:** He was like them, too. Not mad, like Crimson was, or cold like Flame was, but he had a similar look in his eyes. Like broken glass, or maybe a cornered wild animal. A dog kicked one too many times. He was desperate.

[pause]

**Abvinua: ** He was afraid.

* * *

Kimblee pressed his heel down harder, face almost adoring. Blood bubbled past Edward’s lips.

“You look so pretty, covered in blood,” Kimblee sighed, foot grinding down. “It’s a shame, I would’ve loved to hear you beg. But I owe you, equivalent exchange. Trust me, you’ll prefer a quick death.”

Ed gurgled, garbled words that didn’t form spilling into the dust filled air.

“Di-ffer-ent fa-vor,” he gasped, choked. “Di-ffer-rent ex-cha-nge.”

Kimblee had the audacity to look surprised.

* * *

_ Rot decay delight  _ taps a finger to the picture of a man and an array. It’s wearing the fuhrer’s face. Edward wonders if he’s meant to report that. Impersonating the leader of the country is a pretty high offence.

Ed won’t. It’s qi is a twisted mass of screaming and agony, with an undercut of what he guesses are it’s real emotions. He’s pretty sure  _ wrath  _ already knows someone’s out wearing his face.

(it’s a monster hidden under a human’s flesh. Why does that sound so  _ familiar?) _

“You’re to decipher this array in the time the Flame Alchemist is under your command,”  _ Rot decay delight  _ tells him, it’s smile a touch too manic to be the fuhrer’s. Ed’s eyes wander back to the array but otherwise he doesn’t react. He’s pretty sure  _ irate  _ is what’s sliding through  _ agony. _

“We’re giving you a year. You know the consequences if you fail. You are dismissed.”

Once again,  _ rot decay delight  _ falls just a touch short on who it’s meant to be. Ed doesn’t mention it. He just moves to leave.

“Oh, and Fullmetal?” Ed half turns. It’s mouth is twisted into a too-wide smile. It looks nothing like an expression that the fuhrer would make. It looks nothing like what a  _ human  _ would make. It almost makes Edward want to run. “You know the rules. You know what you must do.”

Ed jerks away and doesn’t respond. A gnawing emptiness is growing in his chest.

He wonders if it’s bad, to feel this numb.

Probably. He can’t bring himself to care.

* * *

The Colonel dropped the files in front of Ed, steely blue eyes boring into him as he looked over them. His face screams  _ contempt _ but his qi howls a clashing  _ interest. _

They were personnel files. R. Mustang, Flame Alchemist. S. Kimblee, Crimson Lotus Alchemist. A. Armstrong, Strongarm Alchemist. All majors.

Edward made no move to grab them. He can feel the qi spark  _ irate. _

“These three will be under your command.”

Tainted  _ satisfied  _ cools  _ irate  _ and Ed forces himself not to buckle under it.

“I’m a sniper.”

The response is reflex. He already knew he’d be in charge of Flame but he still doesn’t want to be, much less be in charge of two others.

The Colonel jabbs a sharp, thick finger at his chest before he could react, the force enough to knock the breath out of him and make him choke. It’s going to bruise.

(Better his chest than his knees.)

“You,” he hisses, “are a State Alchemist.”

He swallowed, forced himself steady, and collected the files, tucking them under his arm and standing at attention as if he had never been hit. The Colonel smiled mockingly at him.  _ Disgust. _

“Your next assignment will be delivered to your tent at twenty one hundred. Be prepared to leave at a moment's notice. You’re dismissed.”

Ed turns around, feet kicking up sand, and flees.  _ Interest  _ and  _ lust  _ follows him out, snapping at his heels.

He feels sick.

He misses Hawkeye. 

He heads to his tent.

* * *

On his good days, he can convince himself that he didn’t want to do this-  _ any _ of this. He didn’t want any of this and he didn’t have a choice.

On his okay days, he tells himself that at least he  _ holds back. _

On his bad days, all he can taste is sand and dust and blood and power in the back of his throat and he can only hope his people get their due from him.

(On his worst days, he hunches over on himself and tries to remember what it was like to cry.)

* * *

“Don’t be a coward,” He hisses at them, shoving the gun into their hands. The private’s eyes jerk to him, his entire body trembling and his eyes starting to fill with tears and panic.  _ “Do it!” _

The sixteen year old started rapidly shaking their head, tears beginning to slide down their cheeks.  _ (You were only a few years younger than him, weren’t you?  _ Henry’s raspy purr sounds in his ears, Ishvalan poison over his skin. Ed struggles to not drown in it.)

He can feel the restless qi around him, can hear the uneasy whispers along the line. 

He wants to pull back, to  _ stop,  _ but  _ agony power pleasure  _ is slithering on the edge of his senses and so instead he steps forward. So instead he sneers at the boy and bares his teeth, forcing  _ hate  _ to color his eyes.

He shoves the boy, forcing him to eat dirt. He stalks past him, hissing a sharp  _ “fool,”  _ down at the trembling child.

He breaths in, tastes the sand settling on his tongue, tastes the panic and fear and  _ pain,  _ and-

“ _ I’m sorry,”  _ he whispers too quietly for anyone to hear. To his brethren. His kin

-He claps. Slams his hands down to the sand.

Before him, the town comes alive and the Ishvalans cry to the sky.

* * *

The first time he meets him one on one is in his own town of graves, kneeling before a body with  _ hate hate hate  _ pulsing through his qi.

He should step away, should let him deal with this in peace. The other men have already headed off back to camp, no one would even know he was there. No one would know he’d let an Amestrian grieve over Ishvalan deaths.

He doesn’t leave.

_ (Should’ve stayed in the trenches,  _ Luise growls at him. He’s propped up against a smouldering chunk of wood. Ed tries to ignore the fact that his legs are a mess of gore. It doesn’t work.  _ What were they thinking, letting you loose?) _

Edward steps forward. The air smells like smoke and fire and death and alchemy and he lets it fill up his lungs, lets it settle in next to the  _ leeches, maggots, rot, you belong to me, with me, you’re mine  _ in his soul.

“Come on,” he says, tone harsher than he should let it be. He doesn’t care. Power settles along the bottom of his ribs, spiders crawling over bone, a burn rattling around his chest.

Flame jerks around, his eyes flashing with his fury and  _ hate hate hate.  _ His hand has come up to snap, fingers trembling and the white of the glove stained red at the tips.

He could kill him, Ed knew, could feel the Truth pressing against him, pulsing in the very air they breathed. Could snap and end it all and hide the body and pretend he didn’t know where  _ Fullmetal  _ had gone.

Ed wouldn’t stop him.

Flame doesn’t snap. His qi edges with  _ sorrow misery why why why. _

“Let’s get back to camp, Major.”

He doesn’t look back when he turns away, doesn’t look back when he feels the licking of  _ hate hate hate. _

That’s good. Good men only die in war.

_ (Like me, Edward?  _ Marcus asks, voice far harsher than it had been in life.  _ Or like you?) _

Edward doesn’t answer. His sins drown out the dead.

* * *

_ Come on,  _ he breathes, tugging on Kimblee’s shirt and stumbling back into the tent.  _ You want me. You can do whatever you like. Just give me one favor and you can do whatever you want. Equivalent exchange. _

Kimblee’s breathing is heavy against his neck, teeth digging into his collar bone.  _ Won’t the higher ups get mad at you? _

He doesn’t sound worried. If anything, he sounds like he finds the possibility funny, qi twisting around in circles. Edward wonders if he already knows the others had already done the same. There were no good men in war.

_ Anything you want,  _ he replies.

_ Anything I want,  _ he drags himself back up to Ed’s lips, pressing hard enough to bruise. Ed licks into his mouth, tastes  _ power pitiless satisfaction  _ and swallows it.

_ Anything you want. _

_ Equivalent exchange,  _ he responds, confirmation. His tone is silky, his eyes a dark promise.

Kimblee pushes him onto the mattress, shoving him till he was lying down and climbing on top of him, nails digging over ribs and lips pressed against the rabbit of his pulse. His tongue drags along Ed’s skin, breath leaving goosebumps in their wake. Ed keeps his body loose, muscles relaxed.

_ (Feel familiar?  _ The Brigadier General clicks his tongue. His disgust echoes through Edward’s mind.  _ You always were a whore.) _

_ Good boy,  _ Kimblee hums, bites into Ed’s jaw.  _ Now, why don’t you roll over like the obedient dog you are? _

* * *

She stared at him, qi unreadable, a bundle of twisted up emotions. Ed wonders if he was imagining the betrayal in her gaze.

“You’re a horror story, you know,” Her tone was harsh, clipped and sharp. Edward leaned back to stare at the sky. Hawkeye swallowed, throat audibly clicking. “They tell stories of  _ Fullmetal  _ to the new recruits to scare them into listening to orders. What are you  _ doing?” _

“Surviving,” It was a lie and they both knew it. Ed had never been a good man, but he’d never been outright cruel, not before now. And what he was doing wasn’t  _ survival,  _ it was  _ cruelty. _

Hawkeye started toward him, looking far more tired than he’d ever seen her the closer she got. She dropped something metal into his lap,  _ (iron,  _ the Truth supplies, nothing-smile stretching wider) and it takes him a moment to recognize the rifle scope.

“You have a reason,” She tells him, and Ed knows he must be imagining the tremble there, but it doesn’t stop the guilt from twisting his stomach into knots. Her qi is still too tangled for him to unravel and read. “You have a  _ good reason.  _ You don’t have to tell me it. We’re still sharing a tent. I know you get cold at night, this far out.”

She stalked away. Ed wondered if he’d just dodged a bullet or ate one.

He was pretty sure it was both. It felt like both.

He rolled the scope between his hands. Without his consent, plans started to weave their way through his mind, a spiderweb of traps.

(She was right, he did have a reason. It just wasn’t a good one.)

_ Wrath  _ had forced him into this war. He wondered if he could make him force him out of it.

* * *

The scope makes it all far too easy, the energy wasted in forcing his eyes to zoom in instead funneling into his arrays. He’d never realized how much of a strain it was until it was gone. He feels stupid for not thinking of it.

He’s both in awe of how well the scope works and terrified. The Ishvalans see the red dot and they scream. He pretends that they don’t echo in his dreams.

He pretends that he isn’t screaming too.

(His sins snap at his heels,  _ pride  _ eats at his feet and  _ greed  _ dines with him during the too-cold nights and  _ wrath  _ boils his veins. He wonders if he can avoid the others. He hopes so.

He doesn’t think so. Hope is for the foolish.

He is foolish.)

* * *

“Come  _ on,”  _ he shouldn’t snap, shouldn’t dig into the  _ hate hate hate  _ of Flame’s qi, but he couldn’t quite stop himself. He wasn’t sleeping well.

_ (When did you ever?  _ Marcus drawls from the back of his mind. Ed refuses to answer the dead.)

Flame snarls, glares, Xingese eyes narrowed down to slits at Edward. He slides onto the back of the bike and touches Ed as little as possible.

Ed scoffs, pulls him tighter, wrapping his arms around his waist.

“We’re going over dunes,” He meets irritated eyes over his shoulder. “You're going to fall off if you can’t hold on.”

Flame doesn’t answer. Ed makes sure his bike can run before holding a hand up for Strongarm, gesturing for the other alchemist to follow.

The bikes are faster than any Ed’s ridden before, but the drag of the sand is enough to make them controllable. He leads Strongarm out, can taste the power beginning to crawl up his spine, up his throat and onto his tongue.

He knows what he’s leading these men to. Crimson is the only one he doesn’t regret bringing.

Before him, gunshots crack through the air.

* * *

“Fuckin’  _ snap,  _ Flame!” Edward snarled, left hand working quickly to reconnect the sparking wires in his right. It was too small for him. He should’ve known it would collapse on him eventually.

“I  _ can’t-”  _ Ed shoved him back, pressing against his chest and forcing them into a corner. Before them, Ishvalans had them cornered. Behind them, Ed could hear crazed laughter floating up through the carved out windows.

“That is an order from your commander!” He yanked the other man’s arm over his shoulder, right fingers twitching, the sharp pain of reattachment fizzing along his nerves.

He could feel the reluctance running through the  _ get away get away get away  _ of Flame’s qi. (Ed couldn’t tell who he wanted to get away from. He wondered if he wanted to know.) Still, Flame steadied his hand and-

Snap. Hiss. Spark.  _ Fire.  _

** _Agony_ ** _ .  _

Ed’s knees buckled, his cry choking itself off in his throat.  _ No time no time no time.  _ He yanked Flame along with him, leaping over the smouldering bodies and breathing shallowly. Both from the pain and so he didn’t have the wretched reek of burning flesh scarred further into his mind.

It didn’t work- managing the pain or stopping the smell from invading his senses.

It was  _ hell. _

His Gate- his very  _ being  _ was being torn apart, strip by strip, skin- flesh- tendons- ligaments- muscle-  _ bone-  _ he was being scrapped down to his very marrow, down to his very basics, the heat igniting a wildfire inside of him, burning him inside out and clawing its way up to his  _ soul. _

He was being torn apart into  _ atoms,  _ burned away into ash.

Ed fought down a ragged sob as he ran. He could see Strongarm and Crimson holding their own, by the bikes. He shoved Flame in front of him, forcing him towards the others, before spinning around.

His shoulder  _ screamed. _

He brought his hands together. The clap echoed through the night air, impossibly loud against the screams and howls of the Ishvalans in front of him. His fingers let off sparks, the movement of his right shoulder tearing apart the burn and leaving blood to gush down his arm, the injury not deep enough for second degree but still  _ agony _ . They leveled guns at him, knives and bullets hurtling towards him. His blood dripped into the sands.

He slammed his hands to the ground. Around him, the killing field became his home and the warriors roared their vengeance to the sky.

Behind him, voices shouted out his title. 

Beneath him, the ground wavered, tembled.

Before him, the sands came rushing up to bury him.

* * *

Ed chokes, stumbles back.  _ White white white  _ surrounds him and he has to force himself to not hunch over, to not hide from it. His Gate looms in front of him, impossibly large and with the trailing Tree of Life engraved on it.

His shoulder pulses with his heartbeat. The left corner of his Gate burns, crumbles away. Cracks spread, deep and clawing and Ed can’t bite back the  _ scream  _ that tears through him.

He sobs, trembles. Collapses to his knees and claws at his sides to try and focus on something other than the unrelenting pain in his shoulder, in his soul.

He almost expects to be laughed at, in his pain. Almost expects his stupidity to be shoved into his face, forcing him to acknowledge it.

Instead, all that echoes around him is his own heavy breathing and the dry sobs tearing themselves out of his throat.

For once, the white world is silent. For once, he is left alone. For once, the Truth does not speak, press against him, taunting him with his limbs and his life and his mind and his body.

For once, Edward is left by himself with his agony.

The world is silent and a salamander burns it’s way into his eyes.

* * *

He wakes with his arms pinned to his sides, a heavy weight on top of him. He doesn’t move. His sides sting and his shoulder throbs with a soul deep pain.

He blinks his eyes open, stares up at Flame holding him down, eyes glazed and staring at nothing. It takes him a few moments to realize he’d never tried to get a favor out of him and even longer to remember what had happened.

His first drowsy thought is that Flame is a far better man than any of them give him credit for. Far better than Ed thinks he could ever be.

_ (you’re only a kid,  _ a voice that sounds suspiciously like Winry mourns in his mind.  _ You’ve only ever been a  _ ** _child_ ** _ .) _

He shifts, moving his arms to catch Flame’s attention. It hurts to swallow. His throat feels like he’d swallowed a bag of sand. He swallows anyway.

The man’s eyes refocused, snapping to meet his own. His face melts with relief for a moment before it smooths out and he jerks off of Ed like he’d been burned. Ed forces the hurt that the action causes as deep as it can go. He can’t bring himself to let his senses extend further than a faint bubble over his skin.

He doesn’t want to know what Flame’s feeling.

“I’m not in the medic’s tent,” He sits up, voice rasping and his hands rubbing at the dull aches in his arms. Mottled bruises are already starting to appear.

“No,” Flame’s face is unreadable, though that might just be Ed’s vision trying to double. Spots pulse in front of his eyes in time with his heartbeat, gaping holes in the world around him. “They don’t know how to treat burns. Not the burns my alchemy cause. And after that, well, you were clawing at your sides. I couldn’t move you.”

Edward looks away, rubbing at his side with his right arm. It stung. He fights the urge to dig his fingers into the scratches, the burn. His charred Gate is scorched into his mind, into the backs of his eyelids. He wants to scrape the rot away, even if he knows it runs far too deep to remove.

Flame doesn’t bother talking further, just smoothly getting up and moving out of Ed’s line of sight before coming back with an open jar. It smelled minty.

He’s gentle, when he moved Ed into a better position to see to his burn. Gentle when he smears a cream over it. Gentle and careful as he replaces the bandages. Gentle and careful as he dealt with the burn his own alchemy and hand had created.

Ed's brain felt too slow, moving through honey, running around in circles.

It felt hard to breath.

Edward wants to run.

The gentleness reminds him of another time, four years ago and screaming into the air, crying out  _ I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry  _ like a mantra. Reminds him of a night filled  _ pain pain pain I didn’t want this this isn’t right I’m so sorry this isn’t what we wanted. _

Reminds him of the night where he screamed himself hoarse, screamed till his lungs gave up on him and screamed till his brother came back to him and screamed even further still.

_ Give him back! I won’t let you take him! Take my leg, take my arm, take my heart! I don’t care- just give him back! He’s my little brother- he’s all I have left! Give him back to me! _

Reminds him of the night filled with screams and sobs and too-still brothers and quaking sisters. 

Reminds him of the night filled with  _ what will you give? _

Reminds him of the night where his only reply could be  _ everything. _

Reminds him of the night where all he could hear was  _ what did you do? WHAT DID YOU DO? _

Reminds him of the night filled with his voice begging for forgiveness.

(He’s still convinced it was a fever dream, when the voice answered back  _ it’s alright, it’s okay, I’m so sorry I couldn’t stop you. It’s okay to cry, it’s okay to scream. This will hurt and I’m so, so sorry I wasn’t there to stop you from doing this, from tipping over the edge. I’m sorry you all had to go through this alone. _

  
Izumi was never cruel, not really, but she wasn’t _soft. _She was grit and dirt and spilt blood, was a mismatch of ice and fire. Ed would never be able to see her saying those words, even if he was bleeding out on her table and she thought he was going to die.

_ _

Nonetheless, even if it was a product of his imagination, the gentleness reminds him of that too. Of a woman who had never been  _ soft  _ with him combing back his hair and touching him carefully like he was made of glass, like his skin had already spiderwebbed and cracked.

_ _

Like he was moments away from breaking.

_ _

Maybe he was.)

_ _

_ Flame  _ was not meant to be  _ gentle  _ to him. He was not meant to be careful and considerate when interacting with him. He was not meant to keep his touches light, just enough to get the job done without causing any unnecessary pain. He was not meant to be around Edward and feel anything but  _ hate hate hate  _ coloring his every move.

_ _

Flame was meant to  _ despise  _ him, through and through.

_ _

So why didn’t he?

_ _

(he’d tried everything short of murdering children right in front of him, so  _ why was he still trying to be nice to him.) _

_ _

“Get some rest,” Ed jerked, snapping out of his thoughts. Flame set a thick blanket next to him before turning around and settling down himself, back to Ed. He didn’t move the rest of the night.

_ _

Ed only hesitated a moment before carefully moving the blanket to cover him, slowly lying back onto the uncomfortably thin mattress and staying as still as possible, burn throbbing in time with his heartbeat, breath stuttering through his lungs.

_ _

Edward didn’t sleep well that night.

_ _

* * *

After that, Ed convinces himself it’ll go back to normal once the burn heals up. Surely,  _ surely  _ Flame was just feeling some misplaced guilt for the unjury.  _ Surely  _ that’ll leave once he realizes it doesn’t change anything for Ed.  _ Surely. _

_ _

Nothings changed.  _ Nothing.  _

_ _

Ed’s still the cold and cruel commanding officer who wants nothing more than to watch the Ishvalans burn. Ed’s still the fucker that’s forced them all to go on a killing spree, one after the other, back to back. Ed’s still the one they all  _ despise. _

_ _

Flame. Flame should be able to see that. And then things will go back to normal.

_ _

And then Ed can never get close enough to learn his secrets, learn just how exactly he used flame alchemy. And then flame alchemy can die with Roy Mustang or whoever else he chooses to wield it. And then Ed can  _ fail. _

_ _

Flame just has to get his head out of his ass and remember he hates him. And then everything will be back on track.

_ _

Things will go back to  _ normal. _

_ _

(Ed’s never mastered the art of lying to himself, but he just might be. Flame’s qi never held a sliver of real hostility towards  _ him  _ but it’s easier to pretend it did.)

_ _

* * *

Ed gets up first and leaves quickly, stopping by his tent only to change into a new uniform, yanking his jacket on roughly, shoulder smarting with the action, before heading to report to the Colonel. The fact that he hadn’t immediately is grounds to have him flogged, injured or not.

_ _

They were in a war. There was no excuse but death for not reporting in.

_ _

(They were on the front lines and the Colonel was  _ harsh.) _

_ _

The Colonel regards him with cool disdain when he walks in, an undercut of  _ irate  _ flashing through his qi. Ed likes to pretend that that doesn’t send adrenaline racing through his blood, but he can only lie to himself so much.

_ _

It’s not good to have the Colonel mad at him. He’d never  _ done  _ anything but Ed could see in his qi that he wanted to. Could see that it was only a matter of time before he  _ tried.  _ Ed didn’t want to give him any blackmail material to use against him.

_ _

“You’re late.” It wasn’t a question, and he’s not sure he’s meant to respond. Still, he snaps to attention and opens his mouth to speak.

_ _

Fingers clamp down on his jaw. The panic rises, sending ice flooding through his chest. He hadn’t seen the man move. His chest constricts.

_ _

“You’re  _ late,”  _ A hand buried into his hair and yanked, sharp pain stinging across his scalp. His jaw is let go. Edward hisses and fights not to cry out as he’s yanked higher, standing on his toes to try and relieve some of the pain.

_ _

(He’s on his knees and there’s a  _ sword at his throat and he couldn’t b re a th e ) _

_ _

“Two days, your mission ended  _ two days ago,  _ and you didn’t report in in that time.” Ed tenses his muscles, adrenaline and fear and panic making a cocktail in his veins and he forces himself to not struggle, forces himself to not tremble.

_ _

(He fails on both accounts.)

_ _

“I’m sorry, sir, I got injured and-” The Colonel shakes him roughly, other hand moving to clamp down on his shoulder to push him down. The clashing pain from the burn and the sting of being held up by his hair makes his eyes sting. His vision doesn’t blur, though.

_ _

For once, that’s a relief. Edward wouldn’t know what to do if he started crying. He’s pretty sure that would tip the Colonel over the edge. The man seemed to like seeing him in pain.

_ _

“This is a  _ war,  _ Fullmetal,” He snarls in his face, “You’re insolence and petulence can get others  _ killed.” _

_ _

He’s-  _ too close too close too close-  _ so close Ed can smell the shitty coffee on his breath, the scent of whatever soap the Colonel used filling his nose and making him nearly gag. His right arm jerked, metal fingers itching to shove the other away. He wants to.  _ He wants to so badly- _

_ _

He doesn’t.

_ _

_ (There’s a sword pressing against his neck and  _ ** _wrath _ ** _ boiled under the man’s skin, pouring into his throat-) _

_ _

“Make sure this never happens again,  _ boy.”  _ The Colonel does it for him, shoving him onto ass in the sand. Ed can taste blood flooding his mouth as he bites down on his cheek to stop his scream from leaving his lips as his shoulder smacks against the wooden pole holding the tent up.

_ _

“You’re dismissed.” 

_ _

Ed gets up, pretends his hands aren’t shaking, and flees. The Brigadier General watches silently from the corner.

_ _

Ed’s throat clicks, his qi coiling tight against his skin, blocking out everything around him and-

_ _

He wants to run.

_ _

(There’s nowhere  _ to  _ run.)

_ _

He stalks away from the camp instead of heading back to his tent, ducking his head and darting out of others ways. When he gets far enough away, he doesn’t bite back his  _ scream. _

_ _

* * *

There’s a hand in his hair, pressing him down and forcing him into the mud. A foot kicks him down, pins his shoulders and another kicks at his legs, shoving them forward, forcing him to sit on his knees with his face in the mud.

_ _

He can’t  _ breathe-  _ black spots dance across his vision and he jerks, hands clawing at the ground and finding no purchase. He thrashes, bucking to try and get them  _ off,  _ but he’s thirteen and small and  _ weak weak weak not enough  _ and  _ fuck  _ he can’t  _ breathe  _ ** _dammit-_ **

_ _

“And this,” The Brigadier General snarls above him, yanking his head up so he could finally gasp in some much needed oxygen. “Is what happens to those of you who don’t obey  _ orders _ .”

_ _

Ed gets an eyeful of his fellow soldiers uneasy faces, most of their qi twisting in horror. Marcus is staring at him like he wants to get him away, like he wants to shoot the man keeping him down. Edward hopes his eyes are screaming  _ don’t.  _

_ _

He doesn’t want to see Marcus held down too.

_ _

The hand in his hair tightens and Ed locks his muscles, opens his mouth to take in a gulp of air in hopes of preparing himself for what happens next.

_ _

He’s nowhere near prepared.

_ _

Ed’s face is shoved down again, in the middle of his intake. He screams as he’s deprived of oxygen again, nose burning as dirty water gets up it and his lungs spasm as he inhales the mud and muck, chokes on it. He sputters, heaves, legs trembling and shoulders screaming at him as he presses back against the foot between them, presses back against the hand buried in his hair.

_ _

He could almost imagine the General’s eyes, watching him struggle, watching him panic. Could almost imagine how the grey-blue would darken, how his mouth would twist into a satisfied smile. The man’s qi gave his mind enough ammunition to twist it, to make it look just like it had when Ed had first gotten to the line and had been pressed into a small ass shed in a town only on the map because Ishvalans had been living there.

_ _

His imagination can almost make it identical, can almost conjure it up in crystal clear detail, almost exactly as it had been that day.

_ _

_ Almost almost almost. _

_ _

It’s enough for him to want to  _ heave. _

_ _

Ed wished it couldn’t. He wants to claw his eyes out, to rip them out of his fucking skull so he’d never have to see it again, even if that would never help. Even if it was just all in his head. He whimpers into the muck, pathetic in every definition, his muscles spasming, and wills himself to black out.

_ _

He doesn’t. It goes on for what feels like hours, the Brigadier General yanking his head back up for air, forcing his neck into a painful position, only to force him back down again, qi twisting with amusement at his flails. 

_ _

By the time it’s over, Ed can’t even will himself to stand. He feels humiliated, violated. He doesn’t want to face anyone and the strength in his limbs seems to be pouring out of them, abandoning him like everything else ever had.

_ _

He slumps into the dirty ground, teeth chattering and his whole body wracked with shivers. He can’t feel his toes. He can’t feel his fingers.

_ _

He whimpers, shudders, and looks towards where Marcus was standing, everyone else having already scattered, back off to fulfil orders. He levers himself up, coughing out mud and muck and  _ rot and blood- _

_ _

The Brigadier General flips him over, presses him down onto the desk and fumbles with his belt and Ed’s  _ limp  _ and thousands of worlds away, thousands of hours outside of the moment, unable to do anything because  _ he knew the fucking consequences- _

_ _

The desk digs into his back and he  _ knew  _ this would happen but he  _ hates it- _

_ _

Marcus leans him back into the walls of the trenches, worried eyes scanning him over. Edward opens his mouth, tries to force the words out.  _ I’m fine,  _ he can’t say. No one is fine. Not in the trenches. Not with the threat of the Ishvalans pushing back twice as hard weighing on everyone’s mind.

_ _

Instead he tries to say  _ I’ll be okay,  _ but that’s a lie too. He’s not okay, he’s never okay,  _ Henderson’s breathing is thunderous to his ears- _

_ _

He tries again,  _ I’m not hurt,  _ but Marcus turns away from him and-

_ _

_ Blood blooms on his back- maggots squirmed and squelched, eating at the decaying body and- and Ed has to run run run run- _

_ _

He jerks awake, smothering his terrified cry into the dark at the last moment and throwing himself away from the hand on his arm-  _ throwing himself away from Marcus’s dead body- away from the Brigadier General-  _

_ _

“Easy there,” The hand appears again but doesn’t touch him, moments all carefully telegraphed and slow. It didn’t stop Edward but shoving away from it, his hands sinking into the sand. His shoulder  _ burned. _

_ _

“You’re going to tear open your wounds,” They say, voice low and soothing and like he was a terrified animal, like he was something  _ fragile. _

_ _

Ed wants to  _ snap  _ at them.

_ _

“I’m not going to touch you again,” They- he, it was a he, with scruffy hair and a partial beard and green eyes and-  _ and and and- _ soothed, hands held up and away from his body. Now that Ed can start peicing together his mind, he can tell that the man isn’t an alchemist. His qi burns far too low for that. He relaxes more than he’d like, knowing that.

_ _

“My name is Maes Hughes,” He says, “I’m a friend of Roy Mustang. He had me help treat your burn, since I’ve got more medic experiences. I noticed you leaving the camp and followed- you’re injured, after all. It’s not safe for you to be so far out without any backup.”

_ _

He smiles, gentle and soft and Ed-

_ _

Ed  _ can’t- _

_ _

Fucking  _ hell- _

_ _

He clamps down on his hysteria, automail fingers creaking as he struggles to not clench and unclench his hands. Maes Hughes waits patiently for him to speak- or maybe for him to make the first move. His eyes are calculating, but there’s still a warmth there. He wasn’t lying about being worried for Ed’s safety.

_ _

Ed wishes he was. It would be easier to stalk away if he was. Easier to force anger to color his moves, to color his voice so he could just walk away.

_ _

He swallows, feels his demons pushing in, threatening to steal his voice, threatening to place the long familiar padlock on his tongue, and presses on before it can happen.

_ _

“Flame hates me,” He says, voice a humiliatingly high pitch and cracking and he  _ hates  _ it and that-

_ _

That wasn’t what he had meant to say.

_ _

Hughes’s face pinches, his qi sparking  _ confused,  _ and Ed scrambles to continue, to clarify even though he shouldn’t, even though he should  _ leave it be damnit- _

_ _

“He hates me. But- but he helped me and the burn and he didn’t  _ have  _ to help me and he could’ve just- jus- just dumped me on the Colonel-” and that was a  _ terrifying  _ thought,  _ fuck-  _ “or the  _ medics  _ or fuckin’-  _ anyone  _ else. He could’a shoved me out when I first woke up but he let me  _ stay  _ and he should, he should- just- fuckin’- fuckin’  _ hate  _ me- damnit-”

_ _

He choked, hunching over himself and just barely stopping himself from clawing at his smarting shoulder. Just barely stopping himself from digging his fingers deeper into  _ agony. _

_ _

“Edmus,” Hughes’s voice is so fucking  _ gentle-  _ he’s not meant to be  _ gentle  _ he’s meant to be like  _ Flame,  _ who’s supposed to fucking  _ hate him.  _ “Edmus,” Hughes repeats, and Ed flinches like he’d been slapped at the sound of his name _ (it’s not his fucking name-) _ . Hughes switches tactics.

_ _

“Eddy,” He says, the third time needing to catch Ed’s straying attention. The nickname catches it and he fucking latches on because  _ what the literal-  _ “Roy doesn’t hate you. He’s never hated you. Where-”

_ _

Hughes rubs at his eyes, looking tired and run out and kind of like he’d been hit by a truck. Ed bites down more hysterical laughter. He can relate.

_ _

He’s so fucking tired. It’s nice to know he’s not the only one.

_ _

“It’s late,” Hughes says, sighing and standing, hand held out to pull Ed up. Ed ignores it. Hughes sighs again. “You’re sharing a tent with Riza, right? Let’s get you over to her.”

_ _

Ed wants to question that- ask how he  _ knew  _ that because as far as he was aware no one had ever seen him go into Hawkeye’s tent and she’d never mentioned a Hughes before so  _ why- _

_ _

But he doesn’t, because he’s tired, and Hughes looks tired, and his brain is already muddled, so.

_ _

He just stands.

_ _

They start walking, out in the dark and bathed in moonlight and the lights of the stars and they’re further out than Edward had thought, the stripped up blue-electric lights and burning torches seeming miles away. He hadn’t known he’d gone so far. To be fair, he hadn’t really been thinking.

_ _

He didn’t think things over a lot. It was a problem.

_ _

He was prided as a  _ genius,  _ had always thought that if nothing else, at least he was  _ smart.  _ He had always latched onto that, latched onto the fact that people saw a  _ prodigy  _ when they looked at him. Had latched onto it as an  _ escape. _

_ _

What he was doing, though- it wasn’t smart. None of it. It was going to get him fucking  _ killed,  _ best case senerio. It was so dumb and he was going to  _ die  _ and he was such a fucking  _ idiot- _

_ _

He cut that off, shaking himself in a full body shudder. It didn’t matter if he died. It  _ didn’t. _

_ _

_ Don’t forget. _

_ _

They walked in silence, the two of them. Their uniforms got them past the patrols quickly and far too soon Ed found himself standing in front of Hawkeye's tent, tracing the long-familiar restless qi.

_ _

“And this is where I leave you,” Hughes said cheerfully, voice low enough to not disturb anyone around them. Ed couldn’t understand how he could be so chipper, but his qi made him wonder if it was forced. He turned away from Hughes. It didn’t matter.  _ Nothing mattered. _

_ _

“Oh, and Ed?” He paused, hand reaching for the tent flap. Hawkeye’s qi was still inside the tent. She knew he was there. “Roy doesn’t hate you. He never has.”

_ _

With that, Hughes disappeared into the night.

_ _

Ed shuddered, shivered, and pushed his way into the tent.

_ _

He doesn’t want to think about what that meant.

_ _

* * *

Hawkeye eyed him a moment, watching as he scribbled restlessly in his latest notebook, their shared computer having died out on them weeks ago. His shoulders tensed, feeling her eyes but unwilling to break the silence.

_ _

“You’ve been avoiding me,” She finally says, clearly fed up. “You haven’t been to lunch, you’re rarely sleeping in my tent, Edmus  _ what are you doing?” _

_ _

Ed chews his lip, scribbles a few more lines down- the theoretics of maybe turning half the useless shit in this damned barren wasteland into a bomb (he doesn’t think it’s possible but it’s mostly  _ busy work  _ anyway)- before Hawkeye snatches the half working pen out of his hand and forces him to look at her.

_ _

She doesn’t say anything, just stares at him silently, daring him to lie to her and daring him to remain silent and  _ see  _ what she would do to his corpse and.

_ _

His silence snaps.

_ _

“What would you say,” He says, framing his words as carefully as he can with his complete and utter lack of tact, “If I-  _ hypothetically-  _ found a way to get out of this hellscape, but it involved something. Risky.” 

_ _

Hawkeye’s expression says clearly what she thinks of that, a distinct mix of  _ want to say that again?  _ and  _ god what the hell are you doing now? _

_ _

Ed hunches his shoulders, chews his lip, restrains his first urge to snap that  _ he knew what he was doing! _

_ _

He didn’t.

_ _

“You should know,” He says slowly, metal fingers restlessly tapping away on his leg. “That the only surefire way to get out of here is to be tortured.”

_ _

Hawkeye’s face closes off, smoothing over and not offering him anything. Her qi tangles and hisses and Ed knows that he’s said the wrong thing.

_ _

“No.”

_ _

“Ha _ wkeye-” _

_ _

_ “No,  _ Edmus.” She snaps it, even if her face is even and her tone struggles to remain calm. Her qi threatens to lash out and Ed flinches. “You’re  _ going  _ to let- let  _ yourself  _ be  _ tortured  _ on the off chance you  _ survive  _ long enough that they deem you psychologically unfit to continue serving.  _ No.” _

_ _

Her voice shakes a bit on the end and Edward falters on his retort, a thousand possible responses settling on his tongue and burning to be used.

_ _

_ I’m not a kid. _

_ _

_ I know what I’m doing. _

_ _

_ I can take care of myself. _

_ _

_ I’ve forgotten more alchemy than most people learn I’m not stupid- _

_ _

_ I’ve survived this long why can’t you just see- _

_ _

_ I’m not some stupid fucking kid I’m- _

_ _

He swallows them.

_ _

Plan two, then.

_ _

* * *

He dreams of graves, that night. Dreams of a man running rampant through a town and bludgeoning any that gets in his way. Dreams of a man holding a child’s head in his hands and  _ crushing their skulls- _

_   
He feels sick, he wants to scream. A boy aims a gun at a soldier, still on safety because he’d forgotten  _ and he had to get his sister  _ out  _ and  _ didn’t he look intimidating? _

There’s blood on his hands and he’s shaking because  _ this wasn’t meant to happen  _ and the soldier had pushed past him, he was  _ bleeding  _ why was he  _ bleeding  _ this wasn’t  _ right  _ why- _ ? _

His chest shudders but it doesn’t need to move and his body is crumbling to dust and he’s  _ bleeding dying crying  _ ** _why-_ **

There is the Gate, there is always the Gate, and he can see himself, running,  _ always fucking running,  _ right toward the damn thing and he wanted to warn him but-

There was a boy.

There was always a boy.

But this boy was  _ dead. _

When he screams, he needs no air to keep him going.

_ Why  _ was it always  _ him- _

He dreams.

_ (Little Al-che-mist  _ the Truth sings  _ Little Al-che-mist don’t you know? _

_ Little Al-che-mist, don’t you know? _

_ You are everything, Little Al-che-mist. _

_ You are  _ ** _nothing._ ** _ ) _

* * *

Hughes is the one who starts it.

He sits, quiet, eating, but his hands move, motions in a pattern Ed takes an embarrassingly long time to notice, probably only notices because they’re eye catching enough that they draw his attention from his notes more often than not.

Flame watches Hughes do it with lidded tired eyes and a focus in his qi that suggested it wasn’t just Hughes going insane, and that’s the part of it that holds Ed’s attention, when he finally starts to acknowledge them.

It’s Hawkeye, in the end, that convinces him to give up his lunch hour of alchemical studies in favor of watching the two. Mostly because  _ she’d  _ started doing it too.

Hughes starts to speak along with the hand movements and that’s when he finally realizes he’s  _ signing. _

Ed’s only ever known the standard military signs everyone’s required to know and he feels stupid now, for not thinking of learning  _ more  _ of it, when it could’ve helped  _ so damn much  _ when he somehow can’t manage to unstick his throat and all that comes is a horrible clicking. Even if only Hawkeye could understand him, hell even if it’s just Mustang or Hughes he’d be fine with it.

So he learns, throwing himself into it like he’d done with all the other languages he’d learned and was still in the process of learning. It’s hard and he’s slow and clumsy but he grew up knowing three languages, had written in two till his teacher had forced him to learn the Amestrian script, so it’s not too hard to muscle through.

(He thinks, sometimes, in those quiet, bloodless little moments he can pretend ash hasn’t settled in the back of his throat and his chest hasn’t frozen over.)

  
  


One. Two. Ten bodies dropped, bloody and white and red. Ed held his breath.

The field was clear.

There’s the heavy taste of gunpowder in the air that’s long become the norm for him, a streak of blood dripping down from his forehead, and all Edward could feel was the constant pressure of the maggots underneath his skin. He can’t stop scratching at the burn on his shoulder, digging nails as deep as he dares to go to try and get rid of the preversive ache.

Broken glass littered the partially melted sands in front of him, remnants of Crimson’s response when Ishvalans had woken them all up with gunfire as they attempted to storm the camp. It was where the cut on his forehead had come from, too.

Crimson was fucking lucky Ed hadn’t lost an eye from his little stunt.

“Hold your fire,” Ed barks, hand raised. His men pause, waiting with him. The world fell still, a pocket of air around them freezing in place.

He doesn’t relax when no one moves, but he does take a deep breath. Lets it out.

Ed licks his lips, pressed his senses out as far as he could.

Dim, dead. All of them.

Edward wanted to scream, to rage. To let his shoulders tremble and to roar to the skies about how  _ unfair  _ it all was.

He wanted to. He  _ desperately  _ wanted to.

He didn’t.

There’d been at least two hundred men, women, and  _ children  _ out in those fields. The biggest number any of them had faced yet.

A fitting welcome, he supposed, to the cities of Ishval they’d been brought to  _ raze. _

This, he knew, would become his norm, too.

Dead bodies, piled up a mile high. As familiar as the gunpowder clinging to his skin.

“Gather the bodies up,” He finally orders, tone steel even as all he could bring himself to feel was tired. “Have someone burn them. No point in spreading sicknesses that can easily be prevented.”

He didn’t wait to see if anyone responded. He just turned on his heels and walked back into the camp. He could see other Lieutenants doing the same, most taking the option to flee the carnage. 

The Colonel watched them all, harsh eyes raking over the troops. Ed ducks his head to avoid the General’s eye, caved in skull and brain matter spilling through.

Edward feels rotten.

He sleeps alone, that night.

* * *

“You want to leave,” Hawkeye says, sitting next to him on the sand dune and finally breaking their streak of silence she’d started once Ed had told her a bit what he was planning to do.

“Who the fuck  _ doesn’t?”  _ He snaps back, aching and trying to bury how much it’d hurt, her silence. “What  _ sane  _ person would want to  _ stay  _ here?”

Hawkeye huffed, “Most don’t feel like torture is the way to go. Most just try and mess up their psych eval the  _ normal  _ way- by lying through their teeth. I’ve  _ seen  _ you lie, you could get away with it in a heartbeat if getting away was you’re only intention.”

Her eyes bore into him, as if trying to read his mind. Ed jerked his head away, uncomfortable, and stared out into the desert, trying to ignore her and her damn questions.

She, predictably, didn’t let him. “Ed _ mus,” _ She snapped, something like worry worming it’s way into her voice. When he looked at her again her eyes were sharp, unmoving, her qi a bottle of forced calm.

“I’m Ishvalan,” He blurts out, because it  _ hurts,  _ keeping that to himself, he wants to wear his heritage proudly, even if he doesn’t deserve to. And what he was doing, what he was  _ planning,  _ might get him killed and he wanted  _ someone  _ to know.

There’s a sharp, almost painful twist to her qi and Ed tries to snap his own back as quickly as he can, tries to dim his senses down to a faint pulse before her qi can settle into anything hostile or-  _ or- _

He feels like he’s filled with rot.

“You’re Ishvalan,” Hawkeye murmurs, hushed like she wants to keep it secret, even though there’s no one close enough to hear, dragged out like she’s tasting the words.

Ed hunches over, not ashamed but wary, eyeing her for any reaction outside of the blank way her face had fallen. He bit his lip, scratching at his shoulder, and glarred for lack of anything else to do.

“That explains a lot,” She finally settles on, nothing judgemental or angry in her voice, and her face has lost the blank or sharp edges it’d had before. “It still doesn’t explain what you’re thinking of doing, Edmus.”

He licks his lips, shudders. “I’m thinking of…” he trails off, can’t put it together.

He remembers her horror when their orders had finally come in, remembers her disgust when she’d first met Kimblee, had seen his bloodlust firsthand.

(But he also remembers Leana’s terror when he’d first come to her with his plan, her eyes a horrible incredible death-sentencing red without her contacts in and her hair white at the roots. Remembered Leana’s begging and pleading and then sharp sharp determination when he’d told her what he wanted to do.

Can he trust Hawkeye in the same way?)

“I’m thinking of killing the Fürher.”

(only one way to find out.)

* * *

They’re moving deeper and deeper into the city each day, the air getting hotter and hotter and Edward feels like he’s  _ dying. _

He hand scrambled along his port, making sure everything was lined up properly. His head lolled to the side and he hummed, his own qi trying to soothe Flame’s own ragged and spitting qi.

He licked his lips. “Connect it.”

Nerves sparked, his body seizing as the arm connected. He clenched his jaw so both the scream bubbling up his throat wouldn’t spill and so he didn’t end up biting his tongue. A muffled scream leaks out anyway and he jerks, eyes squeezing shut and breathing ragged.

He lets it all settle, just a moment, and then lurches his way up. Flame’s hand hovers over his shoulder, his other held in front of them in case any of the Ishvalans find them. Ed doesn’t bother telling him it’s useless- the closest Ishvalan is two streets over and appears to be in shock, from the way their qi is just  _ flat. _

Ed stands up on shaking legs, muscles spasming and jerking as aftershocks continuously wash over him. He snatches Mustang’s hand, for just a moment, to keep him close by and to begin leading him.

His nose twitches at the smoke still clinging to them and a glance down the road shows him flames leaping into the air, not yet smothered by sand, and Ed allows himself one small, painful moment to dwell on the ache swelling in his chest before he twists around and  _ runs. _

As they escape, screams fill the air.

* * *

There’s more of them than he expected.

Leana, desperate and angry. Abadiey, vicious and deadly. Hulenv-si, choked and determined.

Kinsuin. Bauvn. Deline-hes. Yonguav. Harissu. 

_ Countless.  _

Some trust him with their names. Some spit at him when he comes to them but do not speak of what he says. Some breathe curses at him and some pray for him.

More, countless more than he could’ve even dreamed.

For once, Ed feels something like hope.

* * *

He’s sixteen, an adult in the eyes of civilians, and the Colonel is  _ smothering. _

He’s sixteen and the Colonel is  _ too close  _ and he wants to  _ scream _ but the man’s fingers are in his hair and he’s afraid he’ll be able to feel him trembling and his teeth are on his lip and _ Edwards falling apart. _

The Colonel hums, backs away, licking his lips, and Ed’s throat closes, panic beating it’s way through his heart and he shudders, tries to stand tall but the Colonel isn’t an alchemist and Ed has nothing to hold over him and  _ oh god what is he going to do- _

The hand in his hair lingers, flexes, before slipping out and Ed’s breathing  _ shudders. _

“Meet me in my tent once you’re finished, Elric,” The man says, a clear dismissal as he turns around, and Ed doesn’t hesitate to spin around and  _ run. _

He feels sick.

* * *

“This isn’t right,” She catches his elbow, fingers trembling. “Edmus,  _ this isn’t right.” _

He jerks his arm from her grip, focussing on packing up. Her qi has fallen into a ragged, jumbled mess and he can’t find it in himself to calm her, reassure her.

It wasn’t right, none of this war was right, but it still continued on, fast and unending.

“Not the first time it’s happened,” He bites back, shuddering and falling apart and trying to piece himself back together as he shoulders his pack. “Probably won’t be the last.”

She looks stricken, when he finally looks at her. Sticken and pained and angry.

He frowns, hunches his shoulders, moves to leave the tent. 

Her eyebrows furrow, her hands clench, before she smoothes over and steps aside.

Edward leaves.

* * *

The thing with Edward’s plans is this: in all of them, regardless of how well thought out or enacted, they always  _ always  _ fall apart.

When he’d attempted to bring back his mother and Granny, it had been a plan built up over  _ years.  _ A plan built by two geniuses and fortified by another. That plan had been carefully crafted, failsafes practically pouring out of it. The circle they had created had been layered over and over again until Ed had been convinced there was no possible way it could end in a rebound.

And it  _ hadn’t. _

The array had done exactly what Edward and Alphonse had intended for it to do- to bring back the bodies of Pinako Rockbell and Trisha Elric illness and sickness free. Or, more accurately, to create perfect copies of those bodies before they had failed. Which would mean they would be a couple years younger than the others would’ve been, but other than that they would've been  _ perfect. _

And it had been. So  _ terribly _ perfect. Ed had seen it, moments before he’d passed out, through the haze of blood loss, he’d seen the horrifying body they’d created  _ reforming.  _

The bones had shrunk, forming the ribcage, removing the gaping hole that had been held open by the pillars of bone. The skin had healed over, had sealed to keep the blood  _ inside,  _ where it belonged. The faces had stretched, skin over teeth, forming lips. The stomach had shrunk, the organs stopping their swelling, the arms and legs snapping and shrinking, compacting down to  _ fit. _

It had all been  _ perfect.  _ It had all been  _ fitting-  _ falling together like puzzle pieces clicking together. He had passed out before he could see their completion, leaving his memories still ghoulish and terrifying, but he could picture how it could’ve ended.

They had  _ done it.  _ Had succeeded where others had all failed, bodies sliding into place where others could only make the horrifying nightmares their bodies had started as. Ed had seen them  _ move. _

But that was where they’d failed, where all their careful plans had fallen apart. 

The circle had been perfect. Any rebound that may occur would be rerouted until its energy finally dispersed, instead of falling back to the alchemists. No rebound could even  _ happen,  _ in the first place- the array had been designed to be anchored, had been designed so that each symbol and rune would build upon each other and strengthen the array as a whole. It was so far beyond complicated that it was a joke to even call it so- if there had been a rebound to happen, that rebound would’ve happened from the start. There would’ve been no extra bodies- just two dead boys and a little girl left to clean up their mess.

No, a rebound hadn’t happened. It was the  _ price. _

That had been the part that had been flawed- not the array, which had accounted for the price such an act human transmutation would have by rerouting that price through Ed and Al- but the very way Ed and Al had assumed the price would  _ happen. _

Because they had known that there would be a price, something big because there just  _ had  _ to be. 

Every transmutation had it’s price. Be it energy or blood,  _ human  _ transmutation would need to be such a bigger cost taxing action or else it wouldn’t be so damn  _ hard. _

And they had assumed they could pay it. Had assumed that through all their training, all their exercises and practices, that there would be no way that the price would be  _ too high. _

Afterall, how could  _ any  _ price be too high to get back their family?

* * *

So here’s how it goes: Edward’s mission flows smoothly. He is back within two weeks, ready to begin the first part of his plan.

There is no hitch, blood soaks down and the array lights up and it’s all falling into place.

Here’s how it falls: he comes back and the Colonel is  _ dead. _

(there’s blood under his nails and his hands shake and the Colonel is  _ dead  _ and  _ none of this was part of the plan  _ and all he can see is  _ red  _ and rot sits heavy on his tongue, pressing and pressing and pressing and-

It should be startling, his sudden promotion. He’s  _ far  _ too young to be a Colonel but-

It’s not. Colonel’s are often the most watched in the military, after all. And Ed knows he’s being watched.)

* * *

The Gate presses and presses and he shudders, gasps, hand scrambling along and he’s screaming and screaming and screaming and blood is slick around him, his body crumbling apart and pulling back together again and again and again and he  _ can’t- _

He howls, sobs, and tears flow down his face, dripping into this nothingness and it’s all  _ white white white  _ and he keeps pounding on the Gate, at his door, his exit and entrance and  _ everything  _ and  _ nothing _ and he can’t  _ feel- _

There is rot.

There is  _ nothing. _

There is  _ everything. _

He is all and he is none and he falls and falls and falls.

_ Be cautious, Little Al-che-mist,  _ The Truth murmurs, nothing grin sharp and nothing hands gripping him  _ everywhere everywhere everywhere.  _

_ Be wary, Little Al-che-mist, _ The Truth parts, the world folds and twists and breaks apart and reforms and-

He is  _ dead. _

* * *

There is no warning, or maybe there was and he was just too shaky and distracted and distant to realize it, but to him there is no warning.

There is no warning and screams rent the air, blood pooling and clotting up the sands, and Ed’s trembling, he knows, in a distant and detached way. He’s shaking and he’s giving orders and then suddenly he’s facing  _ red red red  _ eyes and they watch him closely, watch him like they know what he’s going to do seconds before he does them.

Before one of his subordinates can defend him, his hands have come together and pressed against the man before him’s chest and the  _ red red red  _ eyes burst apart.

He feels sick and tired and his stumps ache but he doesn’t stop moving, doesn’t stop barking orders and getting the frozen soldiers around him moving again. They burst into a flurry of activity like a bunch of irritated wasps and Edward takes a deep breath, lets it all out, and breaks into a run.

It is one of many attacks. The deeper they go into Ishval the more technology the desert people have managed to gather, to hoard. 

When Ed breathes, now, all he tastes is rot and blood, heavy on his tongue. He coils his senses as tightly he can manage and tries, in quiet moments(moments that are never really quiet, that are still punctuated with the shriek of some form of firearm) just to forget. Forget for a moment that this, in another life, may have been his homeland.

(and he knows it was, remembers standing as  _ Evdrasae  _ and facing down alchemist after alchemist. He remembers tearing them apart, relentless, but never  _ ever  _ killing. He remembers standing tall against blonde and blue eyed soldiers and he remembered protecting his  _ home  _ from them.

But he also remembers it all being for  _ nothing. _

He remembers dying, hand in hand with his brother, as Ishval toppled around them and Ishvala  _ sobbed  _ for her lost children.)

* * *

There are three things Edward has learned in his time with the military.

The first:  _ shoot first. _

The second:  _ They are always watching. _

And the third:  _ Nothing in this war is predictable. _

* * *

It’s been only a month since Ed was promoted to Colonel. He is watched, everywhere. Closely. By rot and suspicion both.

It has been a week since Ed found a small child, lost and terrified, out on his patrol. A week since he found a child with terrible and incredible red eyes and horrible and amazing white hair, dark skin. A week since he found this child and hid him in his tent, away from prying eyes.

A week and he should’ve  _ known better. _

_ Rot decay delight  _ pressed it’s hands down on his shoulders, patting them patronizingly as it grinned.

“Come on,  _ Fullmetal,”  _ It drawls, giddy and coiling. “What’s so different about  _ now? _ Are you getting cold feet?”

Edward felt a vice wrapped around his chest, throat clogging up and panic swelling throughout his body. He stared, for a long moment, at the line up.

The boy stared back at him.

His gun slipped from shaking fingers.

(the boy dies anyway.)

* * *

The northern air bites and scrapes, leaving gouges in his skin even as he bundles up as tightly as possible, darkness pressing and smothering around him. His breath fogs out and his stumps ache as the cold invades his body, the northern metal enough to keep him from getting frostbite but not enough to stop it from  _ burning. _

He closes his eyes, lets his senses lead him. Mustang to his right, Hawkeye to his left. A number of others surrounding them. Pinpricks of life pressing on all sides.

Impossible to run from.

A hand brushes his arm, heat radiating off of it. Ed opens his eyes and keeps walking.

He cannot run and he doesn’t think he would even if he could.

He walks towards his death.

* * *

“Edward,” He whispers into the dark, one night, when they’re deep in the mountains and hidden inside tents, the cold pervasive and wet.

“My name is Edward Elric.”

Mustang and Hawkeye watch him, quiet. The others are asleep, their breathing even. The patrol team is half a mile out.

There is a mining town, fourteen miles away. Their destination. 

Edward wonders if they’ll put him down like a sick dog or if they’ll let him try to run.

He wonders if anyone will remember him when he’s gone.

He doesn’t want to be forgotten.

(An Ishvalan’s name is a sacred thing, a precious secret. Edward has given Mustang and Hawkeye many names, but none were his own.

He gives his now, knowing he will die. He gives them a parting gift, as well.

He lies.

_ I will flee. _

There is no running.)

* * *

Excerpt from “The Uses of War Dogs”, an interview between Ellie Sinous(Host) and former Sergeant Finnus Hollard (2 hours 42 min.). First Aired Jan. 24 (1914):

**Sinous: ** … And Fullmetal! Not much has been released to the public about this dog, only that it was trained extensively for its job and that it was given to the then Major Roy Mustang, the Flame Alchemist. You’ve said that you were stationed near Mustang, do you have any more information on Fullmetal?

**Hollard: ** I actually met Fullmetal, once, a little bit before the war ended. I feel bad for Mustang, really, having to take that dog everywhere.

**Sinous: ** Oh?

**Hollard: ** Don’t get me wrong, Fullmetal was perfectly well behaved, more so than I’d expected-

**Sinous: ** More than you’d expected?

**Hollard: ** Ah, yes, well, Fullmetal was used on the front lines, you see, so I expected to see a bit of aggression towards those he wasn’t used to, maybe even some hesitance, but even with his muzzle on Fullmetal just sat by Mustang’s side perfectly content. And, well-

[Pause]

**Sinous: ** Sir?

**Hollard: ** [laughs] Sorry, sorry! Just thinking. There were some rumours, you see, that Fullmetal bit most of his previous handlers, before being brought to Mustangs. Some even said he’d killed one. I think they were just that, though. Rumours. 

**Sinous: ** Interesting rumours, though.

**Hollard: ** Yes, well [sighs] I wouldn’t put much stock into them. Fullmetal seemed like a really happy dog, can’t imagine him aggressive enough to go against his handlers.

**Sinous: ** That may be so, but you were saying something about feeling bad for Mustang before I rudely interrupted?

**Hollard:** Oh! Right, right. So as I was saying, Fullmetal was a very well behaved dog it was just that- 

[pause]

**Hollard:** You see, Fullmetal, he was  _ big. _ I don’t think he was even mostly dog, if I’m being honest. He looked like a breed between a golden retriever and one of those desert wolves, just scaled up. I can’t imagine keeping such a big dog in my house, much less in a cramped tent.

**Sinous: ** Fullmetal was kept in Mustang’s tent?

**Hollard:** Yes, he was. Not everyone supports the use of military dogs, you know, so during the Ishvalan War any dogs issued would be kept inside their handler’s tents, so that no one could either kill them in the night or let them go out into the desert.

**Sinous:** You say ‘issued’ like Fullmetal was on the same level as a gun or a uniform, why is that?

**Hollard:** Well [pause] you’ll likely hear this anyway, if you go digging, but there’s a theory among the lower ranked members of the military that served in the war. Do you know anything about Fullmetal, the alchemist Fullmetal, that died a few months after Order #3066 was issued?

**Sinous: ** He did come up when I was researching Fullmetal, the dog, but there’s even less about him than the dog. His public file said he was rewarded his Alchemist Watch in 1904, died in 1908, and that his last name was Elric. There’s not much more than that, I’m afraid.

**Hollard: ** That’s not surprising. You see, I was stationed by Mustang near the end of the war, but right after the Order was sent out my tent was set up closer to the western sector, more in the country lands than in the deserts. And there was this  _ kid  _ that passed through.

**Sinous: ** A kid? 

**Hollard: ** Yes, he looked no older than fourteen, I remember thinking when I saw him. I can’t remember much, but I do remember that he looked like he was made out of  _ gold. _

**Sinous:** Like a descendant of a Xerxsian? They were said to have the coloring of gold.

**Hollard: ** Exactly. I thought it was weird, you know, almost thought I was hallucinating, but other people were talking about it too. The kid made of gold, they kept saying over and over again, do you know him? And everyone kept answering no, again and again. But, a few weeks before I was transferred over eastern, we got our answer.

**Sinous: ** Let me guess, he was called the Fullmetal Alchemist?

**Hollard: ** (laughs) No, actually. They called him Elric, a sniper. One of the best shots they had. It wasn’t until later, when I saw the boy with Mustang a week before those two left on the mission that got Elric killed, that I realized he was the Fullmetal people kept talking about.

**Sinous: ** Did no one mention he was a kid?

**Hollard: ** No one ever actually said anything about him other than that he was young, never how young, and that he was a State Alchemist, and a rather terrifying one at that. No one ever used his name, either, just Fullmetal. But then again, none of us used State Alchemist’s names anyway, just their titles, so that’s not too weird. [sighs]

**Sinous: ** It’s an interesting story, surely, but I don’t see how this ties into Fullmetal the dog, outside of the shared name. Is there more?

**Hollard: ** Well, Mustang and Elric were friends, or somewhere close to that, and Elric’s death was unexpected. He was young, yes, but he was also rumoured to be overwhelmingly strong. And then, just a couple months after his death, Mustang is brought this dog with perfectly golden fur that’s named Fullmetal in ‘honor of the Fullmetal we lost’? I’ve never bought that.

**Sinous: ** Are you insinuating that the military had a hand in Elric’s death? Or that Fullmetal  _ is  _ Elric?

**Hollard: ** [laughs] No, no! Nothing like that. Personally, I think Fullmetal was either bred or made to look like Elric and given to Mustang as a warning or something. Everyone knew Mustang was gunning for the Fürher’s title, even back then, though he wasn’t the most popular. 

**Sinous: ** Made?

**Hollard: ** Like a chimera, animals that have been alchemically merged together to form one creature.

**Sinous: ** That doesn’t sound pleasant. You think Fullmetal is one of those?

**Hollard: ** Yes, he certainly looked like one, even if he was a bit cleaner than they’re usually said to be. [laughs] It sounds so stupid to say outloud, but a lot of us were convinced of it. Are still convinced of it. A bioengineered weapon designed for the purpose of warning Mustang off.

**Sinous: ** It does sound a bit far-fetched, even if it makes for an interesting story.

**Hollard: ** Of course, we could’ve all been just reading into it too much and it really was a harmless gift, or maybe a simple coincidence. [sighs] You’re right about it being far-fetched.

**Sinous: ** Do you know of any other theories regarding Fullmetal?

**Hollard: ** Sadly, no. Our commanding officer tended to shut us down pretty quickly when he caught us chatting about it, and there wasn’t much time to chat down there anyway. Any theories tossed out tend to not have much evidence behind them. Too bad we’ll never be able to confirm any, since I heard from a few people who got sent home with Mustang’s group that Fullmetal was euthanized right before the war ended. For Aggression. [scoffs]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hhhosadhfdps thank you for reading my garbage!!! If you want to talk to me about fandom shit, talk to me about my stories, or want to bully me into writing more of this y'all can do that on my [Tumblr!](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/like-that-one-weird-dog-thing) My only warning is I have no idea what I'm doing and probably won't be crazy active outside of like, random bursts when I pop on once a day to see what has popped up on my dash. It's also not a fma blog it's for all my shit so,,,
> 
> Also, y'all, if you want to comment smth but don't have anything to comment, I accept key smashes, you could literally comment a single letter and I would still thank you, I don't care what you comment I will still love it, even it's begging for an update I will still accept it- it may make me panic but that does not mean I don't adore it
> 
> But just a warning: I can and will respond with essays if y'all ask me any questions. I will word vomit all my lore onto you if you ask for it. I'm not gonna respond to any of my comments on my first chapter that I haven't already cause they're so old but I will respond to all that pop on this one

**Author's Note:**

> Can I cry??? I'm crying. ao3 apparently doesn't like how I format shit so I had to go manually write it all out.(Edit: I had to do it again!! it's not anymore fun the second time-)
> 
> that was fun
> 
> Thanks for reading this, reviews and kudos are awesome but honestly I'm mostly hung up on the fact some people actually click on my writing. 
> 
> this is only part one of this thing, and if everything goes to plan there should be three more parts after this. Four if inspiration hits and my plan goes up in flames. Don't know when the next part will come out, it might be in two weeks it might be in two months. This won't be abandoned, though, even if it decides to shred my sanity
> 
> bye,,


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